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HANDBOUND
AT THE

VOLUME 16
MACAULAY-MICKIEWICZ

UNIVERSITY EDITION

THE WARNER LIBRARY

IN THIRTY VOLUMES

VOLS. 1-26
THE WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE

VOL. 27

THE BOOK OF SONGS AND LYRICS

VOL. 28
THE READER'S DICTIONARY OF AUTHORS

VOL. 29
THE READER'S DIGEST OF BOOKS

VOL. 30
THE STUDENT'S COURSE IN LITERATURE

GENERAL INDEX

t«

NEW STEAD ABBEY-

The ancestral home of the family of Lord Byron.
Original Etching from an Old Engraving.

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gni'/£-r§nH blO nr, mcnl 5;

UNIVERSITY EDITION

THE WARNER LIBRARY

IN THIRTY VOLUMES
VOLUME 16

THE

WORLD'S BEST

LITERATURE

EDITORS

JOHN W. CUNLIFFE
ASHLEY H. THORNDIKE

PROFESSORS OF ENGLISH IN COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

FOUNDED BY

CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER

NEW YORK

PRINTED AT THE KNICKERBOCKER

PRESS FOR THE WARNER LIBRARY COMPANY

TORONTO: GLASGOW, BROOK & COMPANY

1917

V tl

.it

ADVISORY COUNCIL

EDWIN A. ALDERMAN

President of the University of Virginia

RICHARD BURTON

Professor of English in the University of Minnesota

MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN

American Ambassador to Denmark; Formerly Professor of Literature
. in the Catholic University of America

BRANDER MATTHEWS

Professor of Dramatic Literature in Columbia University

WILLIAM LYON PHELPS

Professor of English in Yale University

PAUL SHOREY

Professor of Greek in the University of Chicago

WILLIAM M. SLOANE

Seth Low Professor of History in Columbia University

CRAWFORD H. TOY

Professor Emeritus of Hebrew in Harvard University

WILLIAM P. TRENT

Professor of English Literature in Columbia University

BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER

President of the University of California

GEORGE M. WRONG

Professor of History in the University of Toronto

CONTENTS

THOMAS BABIXGTON MACAULAY, 1800-1859 PAGE

CRITICAL ESSAY, by John Bach McMaster . . . . ' 9381

The (Coffee-House 9386

The Difficulty of Travel in England, 1685 9388

The Highwayman .......... 9395

The Delusion of Overrating the Happiness of our Ancestors . . 9397

The Puritan 9399

Spain under Philip II. ......... 9402

The Character of Charles II. of England 9406

The Church of Rome 9408

Loyola and the Jesuits ......... 9411

The Reign of Terror 9415

The Trial of Warren Hastings ........ 9419

Horatius 9422

The Battle of Ivry 9437

JUSTIN MCCARTHY, 1830-1912

CRITICAL ESSAY ..... 9440

The King Is Dead — Long Live the Queen 9441

A Modern English Statesman 9450

GEORGE MACDOXALD, 1824-1905

CRITICAL ESSAY 9455

The Flood 9456

The Hay-Loft 9464

JEAN MACE, 1815-1894

CRITICAL ESSAY 9473

The Necklace of Truth 9474

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI, 1469-1527

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Charles P. Nefll . . . . . . . 9479

The Conspiracy against Carlo Galeazzo, Duke of Milan . . . 94^8

How a Prince Ought to Avoid Flatterers 9492

Exhortation to Lorenzo de' Medici ....... 9493

Vlll CONTENTS

PERCY MACKAYE, 1875- PAGE

CRITICAL ESSAY . . . . . . . . . 9494 a

From ' The Canterbury Pilgrims ' . . . . . . 9494 b

The Scarecrow, Act. iv 9494 g

NORMAN MACLEOD, 1812-1872

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9495

The Home-Coming .......... 9497

Highland Scenery .......... 9500

My Little May .......... 9501

JOHN BACH McMASTER, 1852-

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9503

Town and Country Life in 1800 ....... 9504

Effects of the Embargo of 1807 . . . . . . .9513

ANDREW MACPHAIL, 1864-

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Archibald MacMechan . . . . . 9514 a

Psychology of the Suffragette . . . . . . . 9514 c

EMERICH MADACH, 1823-1864

CRITICAL ESSAY, by George Alexander Kohut . . . . . .9515

From the ' Tragedy of Man ' ........ 9517

JAMES MADISON, 1751-1836

CRITICAL ESSAY 9531

From ' The Federalist '......... 9534

Interference to Quell Domestic Insurrection ..... 9539

MAURICE MAETERLINCK, 1864-

CRITICAL ESSAY, by William Sharp ........ 9541

EDITORIAL NOTE .......... 9546 a

From ' The Death of Tintagiles ' . . . ' . . . . 9547

The Inner Beauty .......... 9552

From ' The Tragical in Daily Life' 9562

DR. WILLIAM MAGINN, 1793-1842

CRITICAL ESSAY 9564

Saint Patrick . . . . . 9565

Song of the Sea 9567

CONTENTS ix

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY, 1839- PAGE

CRITICAL ESSAY . . . . . . i . * . 9569

Childhood in Ancient Life ..... . 9571

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN, 1840-1914

CRITICAL ESSAY . . . . . . . . . ' . . 9580

The Importance of Cruisers and of Strong Fleets in War . . . 9581

MOSES MAIMONIDES, 1135-1204

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Rabbi Gottheil ........ 9589

Extract from Maimonides's Will . ... . . . . 9594

From the ' Guide of the Perplexed ' . . . . . . 9595

SIR HENRY MAINE, 1822-1888

CRITICAL ESSAY, by D. MacG. Means ....... 9605

The Beginnings of the Modern Laws of Real Property .... 9607

Importance of a Knowledge of Roman Law: and the Effect of the Code

Napoleon . . . . . . . . . . . 9610

XAVIER DE MAISTRE, 1764-1852

The Traveling-Coat
A Friend

9*"-l

. 96l8
Q62O

The Library

. 9621

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK, 1849-

CRITICAL ESSAY .........

• 9623

An Evening's Table-Talk at the Villa .

. 9626

SIR THOMAS MALORY, FIFTEENTH CENTURY

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Ernest Rhys . . . . . . . . 9645

The Finding of the Sword Excalibur ...... 9648

The White Hart at the Wedding of King Arthur and Queen Guenever . 9650

The Maid of Astolat . 9651

The Death of Sir Launcelot . 9653

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE, FOURTEENTH CENTURY

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9655

The Marvelous Riches of Prester John 9658

From Hebron to Bethlehem .... ... 9660

X CONTENTS

JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN, 1803-1849 PAGE

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9664

The Dawning of the Day ........ 9665

The Nameless One 9666

St. Patrick's Hymn before Tarah ....... 9668

ALESSANDRO MANZONI, 1785-1873

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Maurice Francis Egan ...... 9671

An Unwilling Priest ......... 9674

A Late Repentance .......... 9686

An Episode of the Plague in Milan ....... 9693

Chorus from ' The Count of Carmagnola ' ..... 9695

The Fifth of May 9698

MARGUERITE D'ANGOULEME (MARGARET OF NAVARRE), 1492-
1549

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9702

A Fragment ........... 9706

Dixains ............ 9707

From the ' Heptameron ' . . . . . . . . . 9708

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE, 1564-1593

CRITICAL ESSAY . . . . . . . . . . . 9714

The Passionate Shepherd to his Love . . . . . 97 17

From ' Tamburlaine ' ......... 9718

Invocation to Helen . ....... 9722

From ' Edward the Second ' . . . . . . 9725

From ' The Jew of Malta ' 9727

CLEMENT MAROT, 1497-1544

CRITICAL ESSAY . ......... 9729

Old-Time Love ......... 9732

Epigram 9732

To a Lady who Wished to Behold Marot ...... 9732

The Laugh of Madame D'Albret ....... 9733

From an Elegy 9733

The Duchess D'Alengon ......... 9734

To the Queen of Navarre ........ 9734

From a Letter to the King; after being Robbed . . . . -9735

From a Rhymed Letter to the King . . . . . . . 9736

FREDERICK MARRYAT, 1792-1848

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9737

Perils of the Sea .......... 9740

Mrs. Easy Has her own Way ........ 9747

CONTENTS XI

MARTIAL (MARCUS VALERIUS MARTIALIS) ?5O-?iO2 PAGE

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Caskie Harrison ....... 9750

The Unkindest Cut 9753

Evolution ........... 9754

Vale of Tears ........... 9754

Sic Vos Non Vobis .......... 9754

Silence is Golden .......... 9754

So Near and Yet So Far ' . . . 9754

The Least of Evils .......... 9755

Thou Reason'st Well 9755

Never Is, but Always to Be . . . . . . . . 9755

Learning by Doing 9755

Tertium Quid . . . 9755

Similia Similibus .......... 9756

Cannibalism . . . . . . . . . . 9756

Equals Added to Equals ......... 9756

The Cook Well Done 9756

A Diverting Scrape . . . . • . . . . . . 9756

Diamond Cut Diamond ......... 9757

The Cobbler's Last 9757

But Little Here Below ......... 9757

E Pluribus Unus 9757

Fine Frenzy ........... 9757

Live without Dining ......... 9758

The Two Things Needful 9758

JAMES MARTINEAU, 1805-1900

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9759

The Transient and the Real in Life . . . . . . 9762

ANDREW MARVELL, 1621-1678

CRITICAL ESSAY . . . . . . . . . . . 977O

The Garden 9771

The Emigrants in Bermudas ........ 9773

The Mower to the Glow- Worms 9774

The Mower's Song 9774

The Picture of T. C 9775

•

KARL MARX, 1809-1883

CRITICAL ESSAY, by William English Walling 9776 a

Bourgeois and Proletarians ....... 9776 i

JOHN MASEFIELD, 1874-

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Joyce Kilmer . . . . . . . . 9777

From ' The Everlasting Mercy ' ...... 9777 e

Xll CONTENTS

John Masefield Continued PAGE

The Yarn of the ' Loch Achray '...... 9777 j

Sea-Fever .......... 9777 1

D'Avalos' Prayer ......... 9777 1

Sonnets .......... 9777 m

MASQUES

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Ernest Rhys ..... . 9777 p

JEAN BAPTISTE MASSILLON, 1663-1742

CRITICAL ESSAY, by J. F. Bingham .... . . 9780

Picture of the Death-Bed of a Sinner ...... 9784

Fasting 9785

Hypocritical Humility in Charity ....... 9787

The Blessedness of the Righteous . . . . . . . 9789

One of His Celebrated Pictures of General Society .... 9791

Prayer ............ 9792

PHILIP MASSINGER, 1583-1640

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Anna McClure Sholl ...... 9797

From ' The Maid of Honour '........ 9799

From ' A New Way to Pay Old Debts ' 9801

BRANDER MATTHEWS, 1852-

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Ernest Hunter Wright ..... 9802 a

American Character . . . . . . . . 9802 d

Shakspere's Actors . ........ 9802 s

GUY DE MAUPASSANT, 1850-1893

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Firmin Roz ...... 9803 d

The Last Years of Madame Jeanne ....... 9809

A Normandy Outing: Jean Roland's Love-Making . . . .9815

The Piece of String 9821

FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE, 1805-1872

CRITICAL ESSAY ........... 9828

From a Letter to Rev. J. de La Touche . . . . . . 9830

From a Letter to Rev. Charles Kingsley ...... 9832

The Subjects and Laws of the Kingdom of Heaven .... 9832

JOSEPH MAZZINI, 1805-1872

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Frank Sewall ........ 9843

Faith and the Future ......... 9845

Thoughts Addressed to the Poets of the Nineteenth Century . . 9848

On Carlyle . . . 9849

CONTENTS Xlll

JOHANN WILHELM MEINHOLD, 1797-1851 PAGE

CRITICAL ESSAY . 9853

The Rescue on the Road to the Stake 9855

HERMAN MELVILLE, 1819-1891

CRITICAL ESSAY . 9867

A Typee Household ... 9870

Fayaway in the Canoe .... . 9877

The General Character of the Typees . . . 9879

Taboo .... 9881

:)FELIX MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY, 1809-1847

CRITICAL ESSAY ..... . 9886

From a Letter to F. Killer ........ 9888

From a Letter to Herr Advocat Conrad Schleinitz .... 9888

Hours with Goethe, 1830 ...... . 9889

A Coronation in Presburg . ..... . 9891

First Impressions of Venice ........ 9892

In Rome: St. Peter's .... . 9894

A Sunday at Foria ......... 9895

A Vaudois Walking Trip: Pauline ....... 9896

A Criticism ..........

'.CATULLE MENDES, 1843-1909

CRITICAL ESSAY ...... . 99OO

The Foolish Wish .......... 9901

The Sleeping Beauty ..... . 9904

The Charity of Sympathy ........ 9908

The Mirror ............ 9908

The Man of Letters ......... 9912

MARCELINO MENENDEZ Y PELAYO, 1856-1912

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Federico de Onis ... 9914 a

Calderon .......... 9914 d

GEORGE MEREDITH, 1828-1909

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Anna McClure Sholl . . . . . 99*5

CRITICAL ESSAY on MEREDITH'S POETRY by Gertrude E. T. Slaughter . . 9920
Richard and Lucy: An Idyl ........ 9921

Richard's Ordeal Is Over ........ 9930

Aminta Takes a Morning Sea-Swim: A Marine Duet . . . 9934

Love in the Valley ......... 9939 a

The Lark Ascending ........ 9939 c

XIV CONTENTS

Meredith's Poetry — Continued PAGE

From ' The Woods of Westermain ' . . . . . . 9939 f

From ' France, 1870' ........ 9939 g

From ' Modern Love ' :

IV . 9940

XVI 9940

XLIII 9940 a

XLVII 9940 a

L .......... 9940 b

PROSPER MERIMEE', 1803-1870

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Grace King ........ 9941

From ' Arsene Guillot '......... 9946

THE MEXICAN NUN QUANA YNEZ DE LA CRUZ), 1651-1695
CRITICAL ESSAY, by John Malone ........ 9956

On the Contrarieties of Love . . . . . . . -9959

Learning and Riches ......... 9959

Death in Youth .......... 9960

The Divine Narcissus ......... 9960

KONRAD FERDINAND MEYER, 1825-1898

CRITICAL ESSAY 9965

From the ' Monk's Wedding '........ 9966

7
MICHEL ANGELO, 1475-1564

CRITICAL ESSAY . 9977

A Prayer for Strength . . . . . . . . .9979

The Impeachment of Night ........ 9980

Love, the Life-Giver ......... 9980

Irreparable Loss .......... 9981

JULES MICHELET, 1798-1874

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Grace King . . . . . . 9982

The Death of Jeanne D'Arc ........ 9985

Michel Angelo. .......... 9990

Summary of the Introduction to ' The Renaissance ' . . . . 9993

ADAM MICKIEWICZ, 1798-1855

CRITICAL ESSAY, by Charles Harvey Genung . . . . ' ' • . . 9995

Sonnet ............ 9999

Father's Return .......... 10000

Primrose ........ ... 10002

New Year's Wishes . . . . . . . . . . 10004

To M 10005

From ' The Ancestors '.......,. 10006

From ' Fans ' . 10006

ILLUSTRATIONS

NFEWSTEAD ABBEY

Photogravure .

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

Portrait from wood

PURITANS GOING TO CHURCH

Photogravure .

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

Portrait from wood

MONGOLIAN BUDDHISTIC WRITING

Facsimile manuscript . » . . . .

,|JAMES MADISON

Portrait from wood

SLAVONIC WRITING OF Xlra CENTURY

Half tone

Frontispiece

Facing page 9381

". " 9398

« " 9479

" " 9501

" " 9531

" " ' 9753

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

(1800-1859)

BY JOHN BACH MCMASTER

IHOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, the most widely read of English
essayists and historians, was born near London on the 25th
of October, 1800. His early education was received at
private schools; but in 1818 he went into residence at Trinity College,
Cambridge, graduated with honor, and was elected a fellow in 1824.
Out of deference to the wishes of his father he thought for a while
of becoming an attorney, read law, and was called to the bar in 1826.
But the labors of the profession were little to his liking; no business
of consequence came to him, and he was soon deep in literature and
politics, for the pursuit of which his tastes, his habits, and his parts
pre-eminently fitted him.

His nephew and biographer has gathered a mass of anecdotes and
reminiscences, which go far to show that while still a lad Macaulay
displayed in a high degree many of the mental characteristics which
later in life made him famous. The eagerness with which he de-
voured books of every sort; the marvelous memory which enabled
him to recall for years whole pages and poems, read but once; the
quickness of perception by the aid of which he could at a glance
extract the contents of a printed page; his love of novels and poetry;
his volubility, his positiveness of assertion, and the astonishing amount
of information he could pour out on matters of even trivial import-
ance,— were as characteristic of the boy as of the man.

As might have been expected from one so gifted, Macaulay began
to write while a mere child; but his first printed piece was an anony-
mous letter defending novel-reading and lauding Fielding and Smol-
lett. It was written at the age of sixteen; was addressed to his father,
then editor of the Christian Observer, was inserted in utter ignorance
of the author, and brought down on the periodical the wrath of a
host of subscribers. One declared that he had given the obnoxious
number to the flames, and should never again read the magazine.
At twenty-three Macaulay began to write for Knight's Quarterly Maga-
zine, and contributed to it articles some of which — as <The Conver-
sation between Mr. Abraham Cowley and Mr. John Milton touching
the Great Civil War>; his criticism of Dante and Petrarch; that on
Athenian Orators ; and the ( Fragments of a Roman Tale * — are still

9382

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

given a place, in his collected writings. In themselves these pieces
are of small value; but they served to draw attention to the author
just at the time when Jeffrey, the editor of the great Whig Edin-
burgh Review, was eagerly and anxiously searching for <( some clever
young man ** to write for it. Macaulay was such a clever young man.
Overtures were therefore made to him; and in 1825, in the August
number of the Review, appeared his essay on John Milton. The
effect was immediate. Like Byron, he awoke one morning to find
himself famous; was praised and complimented on every hand, and
day after day saw his table covered with cards of invitation to dinner
from every part of London. And well he might be praised; for no
English magazine had ever before published so readable, so eloquent,
so entertaining an essay. Its very faults are pleasing. Its merits
are of a high order; but the passage which will best bear selection
as a specimen of the writing of Macaulay at twenty-five is the de-
scription of the Puritan.

Macaulay had now found his true vocation, and entered on it
eagerly and with delight. In March 1827 came the essay on Machia-
velli; and during 1828 those on John Dryden, on History, and on Hal-
lam's 'Constitutional History.* During 1829 he wrote and published
reviews of James Mill's ( Essay on Government* (which involved him
in an unseemly wrangle with the Westminster Review, and called
forth two more essays on the Utilitarian Theory of Government),
Southey's Colloquies on Society,* Sadler's < Law of Population,* and
the reviews of Robert Montgomery's Poems. The reviews of Moore's
* Life of Byron * and of Southey's edition of the ( Pilgrim's Progress *
appeared during 1830. In that same year Macaulay entered Parlia-
ment, and for a time the essays came forth less frequently. A reply
to a pamphlet by Mr. Sadler written in reply to Macaulay 's review,
the famous article in which Croker's edition of Boswell's Johnson
was pilloried, and the essay on John Hampden, were all he wrote in
1831. In 1832 came Burleigh and his Times, and Mirabeau; in 1833
The War of the Succession in Spain, and Horace Walpole; in 1834
William Pitt, Earl of Chatham; in 1835 Sir James Mackintosh; in 1837
Lord Bacon, the finest yet produced; in 1838 Sir William Temple; in
1839 Gladstone on Church and State; and in 1840 the greatest of all
his essays, those on Von Ranke's ( History of the Popes* and on Lord
Clive. The Comic Dramatists of the Restoration, Warren Hastings,
and a short sketch of Lord Holland, were written in 1841 ; Frederic
the Great in 1842; Madame D'Arblay and Addison in 1843; Barere
and The Earl of Chatham in 1844: and with these the long list
closes.

Never before in any period of twenty years had the British read-
ing public been instructed and amused by so splendid a series of

THOMAS BABINGTO.F MACAULAY 9383

essays. Taken as a whole the series falls naturally into three classes:
the critical, the biographical, and the historical. Each has merits and
peculiarities of its own; but all have certain characteristics in com-
mon which enable us to treat them in a group.

Whoever will take the pains to read the six-and-thirty essays we
have mentioned, — and he will be richly repaid for his pains, — can-
not fail to perceive that sympathy with the past is Macaulay's ruling
passion. Concerning the present he knew little and cared less. The
range of topics covered by him was enormous; art, science, theology,
history, literature, poetry, the drama, philosophy — all were passed
in review. Yet he has never once failed to treat his subject histori-
cally. We look in vain for the faintest approach to a philosophical
or analytical treatment. He reviewed Mill's essay on Government,
and Hallam's ( Constitutional History > ; but he made no observations
on government in the abstract, nor expressed any opinions as to
what sort of government is best suited for civilized communities in
general. He wrote about Bacon; yet he never attempted to expound
the principles or describe the influence of the Baconian philosophy.
He wrote about Addison and Johnson, Hastings and Clive, Machia-
velli and Horace Walpole and Madame D'Arblay; yet in no case did
he analyze the works; or fully examine the characteristics, or set forth
exhaustively the ideas, of one of them. They are to him mere pegs
on which to hang a splendid historical picture of the times in which
these people lived. Thus the essay on Milton is a review of the
Cromwellian period; Machiavelli, of Italian morals in the sixteenth
century; that on Dryden, of the state of poetry and the drama in the
days of Charles the Second; that on. Johnson, of the state of English
literature in the days of Walpole. In the essays on Clive and Hast-
ings, we find little of the founders of British India beyond the enu-
meration of their acts. But the Mogul empire, and the rivalries and
struggles which overthrew it, are all depicted in gorgeous detail. No
other writer has ever given so fine an account of the foreign policy
of Charles the Second as Macaulay has done in the essay on Sir Will-
iam Temple ; nor of the Parliamentary history of England for the forty
years preceding our Revolution, as is to be found in the essays on
Lord Chatham. In each case the image of the man whose name
stands at the head of the essay is blurred and indistinct. We are
told of the trial of John Hampden; but we do not see the fearless
.champion of popular liberty as he stood before the judges of King
Charles. We are introduced to Frederic the Great, and are given a
summary of his characteristics and a glowing narrative of the wars
in which he won fame; but the real Frederic, the man contending
« against the greatest superiority of power and the utmost spite of
fortune, » is lost in the mass of accessories. He describes the out-
ward man admirably: the inner man is never touched.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

But however faulty the Essays may be in respect to the treatment
accorded to individual men, they display a prodigious knowledge of
the facts and events of the periods they cover. His wonderful mem-
ory, stored with information gathered from a thousand sources, his
astonishing power of arranging facts and bringing them to bear on
any subject, whether it called for description or illustration, joined
with a clear and vigorous style, enabled him to produce historical
scenes with a grouping, a finish, and a splendor to which no other
writer can approach. His picture of the Puritan in the essay on
Milton, and of Loyola and the Jesuits in the essay on the Popes; his
description of the trial of Warren Hastings; of the power and mag-
nificence of Spain under Philip the Second; of the destiny of the
Church of Rome; of the character of Charles the Second in the essay
on Sir James Mackintosh, — are but a few of many of his bits of word-
painting which cannot be surpassed. What is thus true of particular
scenes and incidents in the Essays is equally true of many of them
in the whole. Long periods of time, great political movements, com-
plicated policies, fluctuations of ministries, are sketched with an accu-
racy, animation, and clearness not to be met with in any elaborate
treatise covering the same period.

While Macaulay was writing two and three essays a year, he won
renown in a new field by the publication of (The Lays of Ancient
Rome.* They consist of four ballads — <Horatius); (The Battle of
the Lake Regillus*; < Virginius'; and < The Prophecy of Capys* — which
are supposed to have been sung by Roman minstrels, and to belong
to a very early period in the history of the city. In them are re-
peated all the merits and all the defects of the Essays. The men
and women are mere enumerations of qualities; the battle pieces are
masses of uncombined incidents: but the characteristics of the periods
treated have been caught and reproduced with perfect accuracy. The
setting of Horatius, which belongs to the earliest days of Rome,
is totally different from the setting of the Prophecy of Capys, which
belongs to the time when Rome was fast acquiring the mastery over
Italy ; and in each case the setting is studiously and remarkably exact.
In these poems, again, there is the same prodigious learning, the same
richness of illustration, which distinguish the essays; and they are
adorned with a profusion of metaphor and aptness of epithets which
is most admirable.

The 'Lays* appeared in 1842, and at once found their way into
popular favor. Macaulay's biographer assures us that in ten years
18,000 copies were sold in Great Britain; 40,000 copies in twenty
years; and before 1875 nearly 100,000 had passed into the hands of
readers.

Meantime the same popularity attended the ( Essays. y Again and
again Macaulay had been urged to collect and publish them in book

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9385

form, and had stoutly refused. But when an enterprising publisher
in Philadelphia not only reprinted them but shipped copies to Eng-
land, Macaulay gave way; and in the early months of 1843 a volume
was issued. Like the Lays, the Essays rose at once into popular
favor, and in the course of thirty years 120,000 copies were sold in
the United Kingdom by one publisher.

But the work on which he was now intent was the ( History of
England from the accession of King James the Second down to a
time which is within the memory of men still living.* The idea of
such a narrative had long been in his mind; but it was not till 1841
that he began seriously to write, and not till 1848 that he published
the first and second volumes. Again his success was instant. Nothing
like it had been known since the days of Waverley. Of <Marmion)
2,000 were sold in the first month; of Macaulay's History 3,000
copies were sold in ten days. Of the < Lay of the Last Minstrel >
2,250 copies were disposed of in course of the first year; but the
publishers sold 13,000 copies of Macaulay in four months. In the
United States the success was greater yet.

«We beg you to accept herewith a copy of our cheap edition of your
work,» wrote Harper & Brothers in 1849. (< There have been three other
editions published by different houses, and another is now in preparation; so
there will be six different editions in the market. We have already sold
40,000 copies, and we presume that over 60,000 copies have been disposed of.
Probably within three months of this time the sale will amount to 200,000
copies. No work of any kind has ever so completely taken our whole coun-
try by storm. w

Astonishing as was the success, it never flagged; and year after
year the London publisher disposed of the work at the rate of
seventy sets a week. In November 1855 the third and fourth vol-
umes were issued. Confident of an immense sale, 25,000 copies were
printed as a first edition, and were taken by the trade before a copy
was bound. In the United States the sale, he was assured by Everett,
was greater than that of any book ever printed, save the Bible and
a few school-books in universal use. Prior to 1875, his biographer
states, 140,000 copies of the History were sold in the United King-
dom. In ten weeks from the day of the issue 26,500 copies were
taken, and in March 1856 $100,000 was paid him as a part of the
royalty due in December.

Honors of every sort were now showered on him. He was raised
to the peerage; he was rich, famous, and great. But the enjoyment
of his honors was short-lived; for in December 1859 he was found in
his library, seated in his easy-chair, dead. Before him on the table
lay a copy of the Cornhill Magazine, open at the first page of
Thackeray's story of < Lovel the Widower. >

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THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

All that has been said regarding the Essays and the Lays applies
with equal force to the ( History of England. > No historian who has
yet written has shown such familiarity with the facts of English
history, no matter what the subject in hand may be : the extinction
of villeinage, the Bloody Assizes, the appearance of the newspaper,
the origin of the national debt, or the state of England in 1685.
Macaulay is absolutely unrivaled in the art of arranging and com-
bining his facts, and of presenting in a clear and vigorous narrative
the spirit of the epoch he treats. Nor should we fail to mention that
both Essays and History abound in remarks, general observations, and
comment always clear, vigorous, and shrewd, and in the main very
just.

£7

THE COFFEE-HOUSE

From the < History of England >

coffee-house must not be dismissed with a cursory men-
tion. It might indeed at that time have been not im-
properly called a most important political institution. No
Parliament had sat for years. The municipal council of the City
had ceased to speak the sense of the citizens. Public meetings,
harangues, resolutions, and the rest of the modern machinery of
agitation had not yet come into fashion. Nothing resembling
the modern newspaper existed. In such circumstances the coffee-
houses were the chief organs through which the public opinion
of the metropolis vented itself.

The first of these establishments had been set up by a Tur-
key merchant, who had acquired among the Mahometans a taste
for their favorite beverage. The convenience of being able to
make appointments in any part of the town, and of being able
to pass evenings socially at a very small charge, was so great
that the fashion spread fast. Every man of the upper or middle
class went daily to his coffee-house to learn the news and to dis-
cuss it. Every coffee-house had one or more orators to whose
eloquence the crowd listened with admiration, and who soon
became what the journalists of our time have been called, a
Fourth Estate of the realm. The court had long seen with un-
easiness the growth of this new power in the State. An attempt

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9387

had been made, during Danby's administration, to close the coffee-
houses. But men of all parties missed their usual places of
resort so much that there was an unusual outcry. The govern-
ment did not venture, in opposition to a feeling so strong and
general, to enforce a regulation of which the legality might well
be questioned. Since that time ten years had elapsed, and during
those years the number and influence of the coffee-houses had
been constantly increasing. Foreigners remarked that the coffee-
house was that which especially distinguished London from all
other cities; that the coffee-house was the Londoner's home, and
that those who wished to find a gentleman commonly asked, not
whether he lived in Fleet Street or Chancery Lane, but whether
he frequented the Grecian or the Rainbow, Nobody was excluded
from these places who laid down his penny at the bar. Yet
every rank and profession, and every shade of religious and polit-
ical opinion, had its own headquarters. There were houses near
Saint James's Park where fops congregated, their heads and shoul-
ders covered with black or flaxen wigs, not less ample than those
which are worn by the Chancellor and by the Speaker of the
House of Commons. The wig came from Paris, and so did the
rest of the fine gentleman's ornaments, — his embroidered coat, his
fringed gloves, and the tassel which upheld his pantaloons. The
conversation was in that dialect which, long after it had ceased
to be spoken in fashionable circles, continued in the mouth of
Lord Foppington to excite the mirth of theatres. The atmo-
sphere was like that of a perfumer's shop. Tobacco in any other
form than that of richly scented snuff was held in abomination.
If any clown, ignorant of the usages of the house, called for a
pipe, the sneers of the whole assembly and the short answers of
the waiters soon convinced him that he had better go somewhere
else. Nor indeed would he have had far to go. For in gen-
eral, the coffee-rooms reeked with tobacco like a guard-room; and
strangers sometimes expressed their surprise that so many peo-
ple should leave their own firesides to sit in the midst of eternal
fog and stench. Nowhere was the smoking more constant than
at Will's. That celebrated house, situated between Covent Gar-
den and Bow Street, was sacred to polite letters. There the talk
was about poetical justice and the unities of place and time.
There was a faction for Perrault and the moderns, a faction for
Boileau and the ancients. One group debated whether < Paradise
Lost* ought not to have been in rhyme. To another an envious

9388

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

poetaster demonstrated that ( Venice Preserved J ought to have
been hooted from the stage. Under no roof was a greater vari-
ety of figures to be seen. There were earls in stars and garters,
clergymen in cassocks and bands, pert Templars, sheepish lads
from the universities, translators and index-makers in ragged
coats of frieze. The great press was to get near the chair where
John Dryden sat. In winter that chair was always in the warm-
est nook by the fire; in summer it stood in the balcony. To bow
to the Laureate, and to hear his opinion of Racine's last tragedy
or of Bossu's treatise on epic poetry, was thought a privilege.
A pinch 'from his snuff-box was an honor sufficient to turn the
head of a young enthusiast. There were coffee-houses where the
first medical men might be consulted. Dr. John -Radcliffe, who in
the year 1685 rose to the largest practice in London, came daily,
at the hour when the Exchange was full, from his house in
Bow Street, then a fashionable part of the capital, to Garraway's;
and was to be found, surrounded by surgeons and apothecaries,
at a particular table. There were Puritan coffee-houses where no
oath was heard, and where lank -haired men discussed election
and reprobation through their noses; Jew coffee-houses where
dark eyed money-changers from Venice and Amsterdam greeted
each other; and Popish coffee-houses where, as good Protestants
believed, Jesuits planned over their cups another great fire, and
cast silver bullets to shoot the King.

THE DIFFICULTY OF TRAVEL IN ENGLAND, 1685
From the < History of England >

THE chief cause which made the fusion of the different ele-
ments of society so imperfect was the extreme difficulty
which our ancestors found in passing from place to place.
Of all inventions, the alphabet and the printing-press alone ex-
cepted, those inventions which abridge distance have done most
for the civilization of our species. Every improvement of the
means of locomotion benefits mankind morally and intellectually
as well as materially; and not only facilitates the interchange of
the various productions of nature and art, but tends to remove
national and provincial antipathies, and to bind together all the
branches of the great human family. In the seventeenth century

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9389

the inhabitants of London were, for almost every practical pur-
pose, farther from Reading than they now are from Edinburgh,
and farther from Edinburgh than they now are from Vienna.

The subjects of Charles the Second were not, it is true, quite
unacquainted with that principle which has, in our own time,
produced an unprecedented revolution in human affairs; which
has enabled navies to advance in face of wind and tide, and
brigades of troops, attended by all their baggage and artillery, to
traverse kingdoms at a pace equal to that of the fleetest race-
horse. The Marquess of Worcester had recently observed the
expansive power of moisture rarefied by heat. After many ex-
periments he had succeeded in constructing a rude steam-engine,
which he called a fire-water work, and which he pronounced to
be an admirable and most forcible instrument of propulsion.
But the Marquess was suspected to be a madman, and known to
be a Papist. His inventions therefore found no favorable recep-
tion. His fire-water work might perhaps furnish matter for
conversation at a meeting of the Royal Society, but was not
applied to any practical purpose. There were no railways, except
a few made of timber, on which coals were carried from the
mouths of the Northumbrian pits to the banks of the Tyne.
There was very little internal communication by water. A few
attempts had been made to deepen and embank the natural
streams, but with slender success. Hardly a single navigable
canal had been even projected. The English of that day were
in the habit of talking with mingled admiration and despair of
the immense trench by which Lewis the Fourteenth had made a
junction between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. They lit-
tle thought that their country would, in the course of a few gen-
erations, be intersected, at the cost of private adventurers, by
artificial rivers making up more than four times the length of
the Thames, the Severn, and the Trent together.

It was by the highways that both travelers and goods gener-
ally passed from place to place; and those highways appear to
have been far worse than might have been expected from the
degree of wealth and civilization which the nation had even then
attained. On the best lines of communication the ruts were
deep, the descents precipitous, and the way often such as it was
hardly possible to distinguish, in the dusk, from the uninclosed
heath and fen which lay on both sides. Ralph Thoresby the
antiquary was in danger of losing his way on the Great North

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

Road, between Barnby Moor and Tuxford, and actually lost his
way between Doncaster and York. Pepys and his wife, traveling
in their own coach, lost their way between Newbury and Read-
ing. In the course of the same tour they lost their way near
Salisbury, and were in danger of having to pass the night on the
plain. It was only in fine weather that the whole breadth of the
road was available for wheeled vehicles. Often the mud lay
deep on the right and the left; and only a narrow track of firm
ground rose above the quagmire. At such times obstructions and
quarrels were frequent, and the path was sometimes blocked up
during a long time by carriers, neither of whom would break the
way. It happened, almost every day, that coaches stuck fast,
until a team of cattle could be procured from some neighbor-
ing farm, to tug them out of the slough. But in bad seasons
the traveler had to encounter inconveniences still more serious.
Thoresby, who was in the habit of traveling between Leeds and
the capital, has recorded, in his Diary, such a series of perils and
disasters as might suffice for a journey to the Frozen Ocean or
to the Desert of Sahara. On one occasion he learned that the
floods were out between Ware and London, that passengers had
to swim for their lives, and that a higgler had perished in the
attempt to cross. In consequence of these tidings he turned out
of the high-road, and was conducted across some meadows, where
it was necessary for him to ride to the saddle skirts in water.
In the course of another journey he narrowly escaped being
swept away by an inundation of the Trent. He was afterwards
detained at Stamford four days, on account of the state of the
roads; and then ventured to proceed only because fourteen mem-
bers of the House of Commons, who were going up in a body to
Parliament with guides and numerous attendants, took him into
their company. On the roads of Derbyshire, travelers were in
constant fear for their necks, and were frequently compelled to
alight and lead their beasts. The great route through Wales
to Holyhead was in such a state that in 1685, a viceroy going
to Ireland was five hours in traveling fourteen miles, from St.
Asaph to Conway. Between Conway and Beaumaris he was
forced to walk a great part of the way; and his lady was car-
ried in a litter. His coach was, with much difficulty and by the
help of many hands, brought after him entire. In general, car-
riages were taken to pieces at Conway, and borne on the shoul-
ders of stout Welsh peasants to the Menai Straits. In some

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 939 r

parts of Kent and Sussex, none but the strongest horses could
in winter get through the bog, in which at every step they
sank deep. The markets were often inaccessible during several
months. It is said that the fruits of the earth were sometimes
suffered to rot in one place, while in another place, distant only
a few miles, the supply fell far short of the demand. The
wheeled carriages were in this district generally pulled by oxen.
When Prince George of Denmark visited the stately mansion of
Petworth in wet weather, he was six hours in going nine miles;
and it was necessary that a body of sturdy hinds should be on
each side of his coach, in order to prop it. Of the carriages
which conveyed his retinue, several were upset and injured.
A letter from one of the party has been preserved, in which
the unfortunate courtier complains that during fourteen hours
he never once alighted, except when his coach was overturned
or stuck fast in the mud.

One chief cause of the badness of the roads seems to have
been the defective state of the law. Every parish was bound
to repair the highways which passed through it. The peasantry
were forced to give their gratuitous labor six days in the year.
If this was not sufficient, hired labor was employed, and the
expense was met by a parochial rate. That a route connecting
two great towns, which have a large and thriving trade with
each other, should be maintained at the cost of the rural popu-
lation scattered between them, is obviously unjust; and this
injustice was peculiarly glaring in the case of the Great North
Road, which traversed very poor and thinly inhabited districts,
and joined very rich and populous districts. Indeed, it was not
in the power of the parishes of Huntingdonshire to mend a high-
way worn by the constant traffic between the West Riding of
Yorkshire and London. Soon after the Restoration this griev-
ance attracted the notice of Parliament; and an act, the first of
our many turnpike acts? was passed, imposing a small toll on
travelers and goods, for the purpose of keeping some parts of
this important line of communication in good Tepair. This inno-
vation, however, excited many murmurs; and the other great
avenues to the capital were long left under the old system. A
change was at length effected, but not without much difficulty.
For unjust and absurd taxation to which men are accustomed is
often borne far more willingly than the most reasonable impost
which is new. It was not till many toll-bars had been violently

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

pulled down, till the troops had in many districts been forced to
act against the people, and till much blood had been shed, that a
good system was introduced. By slow degrees reason triumphed
over prejudice; and our island is now crossed in every direction
by near thirty thousand miles of turnpike road.

On the best highways heavy articles were, in the time of
Charles the Second, generally conveyed from place to place by
stage-wagons. In the straw of these vehicles nestled a crowd
of passengers, who could not afford to travel by coach or on
horseback, and who were prevented by infirmity, or by the weight
of their luggage, from going on foot. Trie expense of transmit-
ting heavy goods in this way was enormous. From London to
Birmingham the charge was seven pounds a ton; from London
to Exeter twelve pounds a ton. This was about fifteen pence a
ton for every mile; more by a third than was afterwards charged
on turnpike roads, and fifteen times what is now demanded
by railway companies. The cost of conveyance amounted to a
prohibitory tax on many useful articles. Coal in particular was
never seen except in the districts wh6re it was produced, or in
the districts to which it could be carried by sea; and was indeed
always known in the south of England by the name of sea-coal.

On by-roads, and generally throughout the country north of
York and west of Exeter, goods were carried by long trains of
pack-horses. These strong and patient beasts, the breed of which
is now extinct, were attended by a class of men who seem to
have borne much resemblance to the Spanish muleteers. A trav-
eler of humble condition often found it convenient to perform a
journey mounted on a pack-saddle between two baskets, under the
care of these hardy guides. The expense of this mode of con-
veyance was small. But the caravan moved at a foot's pace; and
in winter the cold was often insupportable.

The rich commonly traveled in their own carriages, with at
least four horses. Cotton, the facetious poet, attempted to go
from London to the Peak with a single pair; but found at St.
Albans that the journey would be insupportably tedious, and
altered his plan. -A coach-and-six is in our time never seen,
except as part of some pageant. The frequent mention there-
fore of such equipages in old books is likely to mislead us. We
attribute to magnificence what was really the effect of a very
disagreeable necessity. People in the time of Charles the Sec-
ond traveled with six horses, because with a smaller number

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

9393

there was great danger of sticking fast in the mire. Nor were
even six horses always sufficient. Vanbrugh, in the succeeding
generation, described with great humor the way in which a
country gentleman, newly chosen a member of Parliament, went
up to London. On that occasion all the exertions of six beasts,
two of which had been taken- from the plow, could not save the
family coach from being imbedded in a quagmire.

Public carriages had recently been much improved. During
the years which immediately followed the Restoration, a dili-
gence ran between London and Oxford in two days. The pas-
sengers slept at Beaconsfield. At length, in the spring of. 1669,
a great and daring innovation was attempted. It was announced
that a vehicle, described as the Flying Coach, would perform the
whole journey between sunrise and sunset. This spirited under-
taking was solemnly considered and sanctioned by the Heads of
the University, and appears to have excited the same sort of in-
terest which is excited in our own time by the opening of a new
railway. The Vice-Chancellor, by a notice affixed in all public
places, prescribed the hour and place of departure. The success
of the experiment was complete. At six in the morning the car-
riage began to move from before the ancient front of All Souls
College; and at seven in the evening the adventurous gentlemen
who had run the first risk were safely deposited at their inn in
London. The emulation of the sister university was moved;
and soon a diligence was set up which in one day carried passen-
gers from Cambridge to the capital. At the close of the reign
of Charles the Second, flying carriages ran thrice a week from
London to the chief towns. But no stage-coach, indeed no stage-
wagon, appears to have proceeded further north than York, or
further west than Exeter. The ordinary day's journey of a flying
coach was about fifty miles in the summer; but in winter, when
the ways were bad and the nights long, little more than thirty.
The Chester coach, the York coach, and the Exeter coach gen-
erally reached London in four days during the fine season, but at
Christmas not till the sixth day. The passengers, six in number,
were all seated in the carriage; for accidents were so frequent
that it would have been most perilous to mount the roof. The
ordinary fare was about twopence halfpenny a mile in summer,
and somewhat more in winter.

This mode of traveling, which by Englishmen of the pres-
ent day would be regarded as insufferably slow, seemed to our

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

ancestors wonderfully and indeed alarmingly rapid. In a work
published a few months before the death of Charles the Second,
the flying coaches are extolled as far superior to any similar
vehicles ever known in the world. Their velocity is the subject
of special commendation, and is triumphantly contrasted with
the sluggish pace of the Continental posts. But with boasts like
these was mingled the sound of complaint and invective. The
interests of large classes had been unfavorably affected by the
establishment of the new diligences; and as usual, many per-
sons were, from mere stupidity and obstinacy, disposed to clamor
against the innovation simply because it was an innovation. It
was vehemently argued that this mode of conveyance would be
fatal to the breed of horses and to the noble art of horseman-
ship; that the Thames, which had long been an important nursery
of seamen, would cease to be the chief thoroughfare from London
up to Windsor and down to Gravesend; that saddlers and spur-
riers would be ruined by hundreds; that numerous inns, at which
mounted travelers had been in the habit of stopping, would be
deserted, and would no longer pay any rent; that the new car-
riages were too hot in summer and too cold in winter; that the
passengers were grievously annoyed by invalids and crying child-
ren; that the coach sometimes reached the inn so late that it
was impossible to get supper, and sometimes started so early that
it was impossible to get breakfast. On these grounds it was
gravely recommended that no public coach should be permitted
to have more than four horses, to start oftener than once a week,
or to go more than thirty miles a day. It was hoped that if
this regulation were adopted, all except the sick and the lame
would return to the old mode of traveling. Petitions embodying
such opinions as these were presented to the King in council
from several companies of the City of London, from several pro-
vincial towns, and from the justices of several counties. We
smile at these things. It is not impossible that our descendants,
when they read the history of the opposition offered by cupidity
and prejudice to the improvements of the nineteenth century,
may smile in their turn.

In spite of the attractions of the flying coaches, it was still
usual for men who enjoyed health and vigor, and who were not
incumbered by much baggage, to perform long journeys on
horseback. If a traveler wished to move expeditiously, he rode
post. Fresh saddle-horses and guides were to be procured afc

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

convenient distances along all the great lines of road. The charge
was threepence a mile for each horse, and fourpence a stage for
the guide. In this manner, when the ways were good, it was
possible to travel, for a considerable time, as rapidly as by any
conveyance known in England, till vehicles were propelled by
steam. There were as yet no post-chaises; nor could those who
rode in their own coaches ordinarily procure a change of horses.
The King, however, and the great officers of State, were able
to command' relays. Thus, Charles commonly went in one day
from Whitehall to Newmarket, a distance of about fifty-five miles,
through a level country; and this was thought by his subjects a
proof of great activity. Evelyn performed the same journey in
company with the Lord Treasurer Clifford. The coach was drawn
by six horses, which were changed at Bishop Stortford and again
at Chesterford. The travelers reached Newmarket at night. Such
a mode of conveyance seems to have been considered as a rare
luxury, confined to princes and ministers.

THE HIGHWAYMAN
From the < History of England >

WHATEVER might be the way in which a journey was per-
formed, the travelers, unless they were numerous and
well armed, ran considerable risk of being stopped and
plundered. The mounted highwayman, a marauder known to ouf
generation only from books, was to be found on every main road.
The waste tracts which lay on the great routes near London were
especially haunted by plunderers of this class. Hounslow Heath
on the Great Western Road, and Finchley Common on the Great
Northern Road, were perhaps the most celebrated of these spots.
The Cambridge scholars trembled when they approached Epping
Forest, even in broad daylight. Seamen who had just been paid
off at Chatham were often compelled to deliver their purses on
Gadshill, celebrated near a hundred years earlier by the greatest
of poets as the scene of the depredations of Falstaff. The public
authorities seem to have been often at a loss how to deal with
the plunderers. At one time it was announced in the Gazette
that several persons, who were strongly suspected of being high-
waymen, but against wrhom there was not sufficient evidence,
would be paraded at Newgate in riding dresses: their horses

0396 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

would also be shown; and all gentlemen who had been robbed
were invited to inspect this singular exhibition. On another
occasion a pardon was publicly offered to a robber if he would
give up some rough diamonds, of immense value, which he had
taken when he stopped the Harwich mail. A short time after
appeared another proclamation, warning the innkeepers that the
eye of the government was upon them. Their criminal conniv-
ance, it was affirmed, enabled banditti to infest the roads with
impunity. That these suspicions were not without foundation, is
proved by the dying speeches of some penitent robbers of that
age, who appear to have received from the innkeepers services
much resembling those which Farquhar's Boniface rendered to
Gibbet.

It was necessary to the success and even to the safety of the
highwayman that he should be a bold and skillful rider, and that
his manners and appearance should be such as suited the mastel
of a fine horse. He therefore held an aristocratical position in
the community of thieves, appeared at fashionable coffee-houses
and gaming-houses, and betted with men of quality on the race
ground. Sometimes, indeed, he was a man of good family and
education. A romantic interest therefore attached, and perhaps
still attaches, to the names of freebooters of this class. The vul-
gar eagerly drank in tales of their ferocity and audacity, of their
occasional acts of generosity and good-nature, of their amours, of
their miraculous escapes, of their desperate struggles, and of their
manly bearing at the bar and in the cart. Thus it was related
of William Nevison, the great robber of Yorkshire, that he levied
a quarterly tribute on all the northern drovers, and, in return,
not only spared them himself, but protected them against all
other thieves; that he demanded purses in the most courteous
manner; that he gave largely to the poor what he had taken
from the rich; that his life was once spared by the royal clem-
ency, but that he again tempted his fate, and at length died, in
1685, on the gallows of York. It was related how Claude Duval,
the French page of the Duke of Richmond, took to the road,
became captain of a formidable gang, and had the honor to be
named first in a royal proclamation against notorious offenders;
how at the head of his troop he stopped a lady's coach, in which
there was a booty of four hundred pounds ; how he took only one
hundred, and suffered the fair cwner to ransom the rest by dan-
cing a coranto with him on the heath; how his vivacious gallantry

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9397

stole away the hearts of all women; how his dexterity at sword
and pistol made him a terror to all men: how at length, in the
year 1670, he was seized when overcome by wine; how dames of
high rank visited him in prison, and with tears interceded for his
life; how the King would have granted a pardon, but for the
interference of Judge Morton, the terror of highwaymen, who
threatened to resign his office unless the law were carried into
full effect; and how, after the execution, the corpse lay in state
with all the pomp of scutcheons, wax-lights, black hangings, and
mutes, till the same cruel judge, who had intercepted the mercy
of the Crown, sent officers to disturb the obsequies. In these
anecdotes there is doubtless a large mixture of fable: but they
are not on that account unworthy of being recorded; for it is
both an authentic and an important fact that such tales, whether
false or true, were heard by our ancestors with eagerness and
faith.

THE DELUSION OF OVERRATING THE HAPPINESS OF OUR

ANCESTORS

From the ( History of England >

THE general effect of the evidence which has been submitted
to the reader seems hardly to admit of doubt. Yet in spite
of evidence, many will still image to themselves the Eng-
land of the Stuarts as a more pleasant country than the England
in which we live. It may at first sight seem strange that society,
while constantly moving forward with eager speed, should be con-
stantly looking backward with tender regret. But these two pro-
pensities, inconsistent as they may appear, can easily be resolved
into the same principle. Both spring from our impatience of the
state in which we actually are. That impatience, while it stimu-
lates us to surpass preceding generations, disposes us to overrate
their happiness. It is, in some sense, unreasonable and ungrate-
ful in us to be constantly discontented with a condition which is
constantly improving. But in truth, there is constant improve-
ment precisely because there is constant discontent. If we were
perfectly satisfied with the present, we should cease to contrive, to
labor, and to save with a view to the future. And it is natural
that being dissatisfied with the present, we should form a too
favorable estimate of the past.

9398

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

In truth, we are tirider a deception similar to that which mis-
leads the traveler in the Arabian desert. Beneath the caravan
all is dry and bare; but far in advance, and far in the rear, is
the semblance of refreshing waters. The pilgrims hasten forward
and find nothing but sand where an hour before they had seen a
lake. They turn their eyes and see a lake where, an hour before,
they were toiling through sand. A similar illusion seems to haunt
nations through every stage of the long progress from poverty
and barbarism to the highest degrees of opulence and civiliza-
tion. But if we resolutely chase the mirage backward, we shall
find it recede before us into the regions of fabulous antiquity. It
is now the fashion to place the golden age of England in times
when noblemen were destitute of comforts the want of which
would be intolerable to a modern footman, when farmers and
shopkeepers breakfasted on loaves the very sight of which would
raise a riot in a modern workhouse, when to have a clean shirt
once a week was a privilege reserved for the higher class of gen-
try, when men died faster in the purest country air than they
now die in the most pestilential lanes of our towns, and when
men died faster in the lanes of our towns than they now die on
the coast of Guiana. We too shall in our turn be outstripped,
and in our turn be envied. It may well be, in the twentieth
century, that the peasant of Dorsetshire may think himself miser-
ably paid with twenty shillings a week; that the carpenter at
Greenwich may receive ten shillings a day; that laboring men
may be as little used to dine without meat as they are now to
eat rye bread; that sanitary police and medical discoveries may
have added several more years to the average length of human
life; that numerous comforts and luxuries which are now un-
known, or confined to a few, may be within the reach of every
diligent and thrifty workingman. And yet it may then be the
mode to assert that the increase of wealth and the progress of
science have benefited the few at the expense of the many, and
to talk of the reign of Queen Victoria as the time when England
was truly merry England, when all classes were bound together
by brotherly sympathy, when the rich did not grind the faces of
the poor, and when the poor did not envy the splendor of the
rich.

PURITANS GOING TO CHURCH

Photogravure from a painting by Boughton.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9399

THE PURITAN
From the Essay on <John Milton *

WE WOULD speak first cf the Puritans; the most remarkable
body of men, perhaps, which the world has ever produced.
The odious and ridiculous parts of their character lie on
the surface. He that runs may read them; nor have there been
wanting attentive and malicious observers to point them out.
For many years after the Restoration they were the theme of
unmeasured invective and derision. They were exposed to the
utmost licentiousness of the press and of the stage, at the time
when the press and the stage were most licentious. They were
not men of letters; they were as a body unpopular; they could
not defend themselves, and the public would not take them
under its protection. They were therefore abandoned, without
reserve, to the tender mercies of the satirists and dramatists.
The ostentatious simplicity of their dress, their sour aspect, their
nasal twang, their stiff posture, their long graces, their Hebrew
names, the Scriptural phrases which they introduced on every
occasion, their contempt of human learning, their detestation of
polite amusements, were indeed fair game for the laughers. But
it is not from the laughers alone that the philosophy of history
is to be learnt. And he who approaches this subject should care-
fully guard against the influence of that potent ridicule which has
already misled so many excellent writers.

(<Ecco il fonte del riso, ed ecco il rio

Che mortali perigli in se contiene;
Hor qui tener a fren nostro desio,

Ed esser cauti molto a noi conviene.**

Those who roused the people to resistance, who directed their
measures through a long series of eventful years, who formed
out of the most unpromising materials the finest army that
Europe had ever seen, who trampled down King, Church, and
Aristocracy, who, in the short intervals of domestic sedition and
rebellion, made the name of England terrible to every nation
on the face of the earth, — were no vulgar fanatics. Most of their

* « Behold the fount of mirth, behold the rill
Containing mortal perils in itself;
And therefore here to bridle our desires,
And to be cautious well doth us befit. )J

94oo THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

absurdities were mere external badges, like the signs of free-
masonry or the dresses of friars. We regret that these badges
were not more attractive. We regret that a body to whose cour-
age and talents mankind has owed inestimable obligations had
not the lofty elegance which distinguished some of the adherents
of Charles the First, or the easy good-breeding for which the court
of Charles the Second was celebrated. But if we must make our
choice, we shall, like Bassanio in the play, turn from the specious
caskets which contain only the Death's-head and the Fool's-head,
and fix on the plain leaden chest which conceals the treasure.

The Puritans were men whose minds had derived a peculiar
character from the daily contemplation of superior beings and
eternal interests. Not content with acknowledging, in general
terms, an overruling Providence, they habitually ascribed every
event to the will of the Great Being for whose power nothing
was too vast, for whose inspection nothing was too minute. To
know him, to serve him, to enjoy him, was with them the great
end of existence. They rejected with contempt the ceremoni-
ous homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of
the soul. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the Deity
through an obscuring veil, they aspired to gaze full on his intol-
erable brightness, and to commune with him face to face. Hence
originated their contempt for terrestrial distinctions. The differ-
ence between the greatest and the meanest of mankind seemed
to vanish, when compared with the boundless interval which sep-
arated the whole race from Him on whom their own eyes w.ere
constantly fixed. They recognized no title to superiority but his
favor; and, confident of that favor, they despised all the accom-
plishments and all the dignities of the world. If they were un-
acquainted with the works of philosophers and poets, they were
deeply read in the oracles of God. If their names were not
found in the registers of heralds, they were recorded in the Book
of Life. If their steps were not accompanied by a splendid train
of menials, legions of ministering angels had charge over them.
Their palaces were houses not made with hands, their diadems
crowns of glory which should never fade away. On the rich
and the eloquent, on nobles and priests, they looked down with
contempt; for they esteemed themselves rich in a more precious
treasure and eloquent in a more sublime language, nobles "by
the right of an earlier creation and priests by the imposition oi
a mightier hand. The very meanest of them was a being

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

9401

whose fate a mysterious and terrible importance belonged; on
whose slightest action the spirits of light and darkness looked
with anxious interest; who had been destined, before heaven and
earth were created, to enjoy a felicity which should continue when
heaven and earth should have passed away. Events which short-
sighted politicians ascribed to earthly causes, had been ordained
on his account. For his sake empires had risen, and flourished,
and decayed. For his sake the Almighty had proclaimed his
will by the pen of the Evangelist and the harp of the prophet
He had been wrested by no common deliverer from the grasp
of no common foe. He had been ransomed by the sweat of no
vulgar agony, by the blood of no earthly sacrifice. It was for
him that the sun had been darkened, that the rocks had been
rent, that the dead had risen, that all nature had shuddered at
the sufferings of her expiring God.

Thus the Puritan was made up of two different men: the one
all self-abasement, penitence, gratitude, passion; the other proud,
calm, inflexible, sagacious. He prostrated himself in the dust be-
fore his Maker; but he set his foot on the neck of his king. In
his devotional retirement he prayed with convulsions, and groans,
and tears. He was half maddened by glorious or terrible illus-
ions. He heard the lyres of angels or the tempting whispers
of fiends. He caught a gleam of the Beatific Vision, or woke
screaming from dreams of everlasting fire. Like Vane, he thought
himself intrusted with the sceptre of the millennial year. Like
Fleetwood, he cried in the bitterness of his soul that God had
hid his 'face from him. But when he took his seat in the coun-
cil, or girt on his sword for war, these tempestuous workings of
the soul had left no perceptible trace behind them. People who
saw nothing of the godly but their uncouth visages, and heard
nothing from them but their groans and their whining hymns,
might laugh at them. But those had little reason to laugh who
encountered them in the hall of debate or on the field of battle.
These fanatics brought to civil and military affairs a coolness
of judgment and an immutability of purpose which some writers
have thought inconsistent with their religious zeal, but which
were in fact the necessary effects of it. The intensity of their
feelings on one subject made them tranquil on every other. One
overpowering sentiment had subjected to itself pity and hatred,
ambition and fear. Death had lost its terrors, and pleasure its
charms. Thev had their smiles and their tears, their raptures

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

and their sorrows; but not for the things of this world. Enthu.
siasm had made them Stoics; had cleared their minds from every
vulgar passion and prejudice, and raised them above the influ-
ence of danger and of corruption. It sometimes might lead them
to pursue unwise ends, but never to choose unwise means. They
went through the world, like Sir Artegal's iron man Talus with
his flail, crushing and trampling down oppressors, mingling with
human beings, but having neither part nor lot in human infirm-
ities; insensible to fatigue, to pleasure, and to pain; not to be
pierced by any weapon, not to be withstood by any barrier.

Such we believe to have been the character of the Puritans.
We perceive the absurdity of their manners. We dislike the sul-
len gloom of their domestic habits. We acknowledge that the
tone of their minds was often injured by straining after things
too high for mortal reach: and we know that in spite of their
hatred of Popery, they too often fell into the worst vices of that
bad system, — intolerance and extravagant austerity; that they had
their anchorites and their crusades, their Dunstans and their De
Montforts, their Dominies and their Escobars. Yet, when all cir-
cumstances are taken into consideration, we do not hesitate to
pronounce them a brave, a wise, an honest, and a useful body.

SPAIN UNDER PHILIP IL

Prom the Essay on Lord Mahon's < History of the War of the Succession in

Spain *

WHOEVER wishes to be well acquainted with the morbid anat-
omy of governments, whoever wishes to know how great
States may be made feeble and wretched, should study
the history of Spain. The empire of Philip the Second was
undoubtedly one of the most powerful and splendid that ever
existed in the world. In Europe, he ruled Spain, Portugal, the
Netherlands on both sides of the Rhine, Tranche Comte, Rous-
sillon, the Milanese, and the Two Sicilies. Tuscany, Parma,
and the other small States of Italy, were as completely dependent
on him as the Nizam and the Rajah of Berar now are on the
East India Company. In Asia, the King of Spain was master of
the Philippines, and of all those rich settlements which the Por-
tuguese had made on the coasts of Malabar and Coromandel, in
the Peninsula of Malacca, and in the spice islands of the Eastern

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9403

Archipelago. In America, his dominions extended on each side
of the equator into the temperate zone. There is reason to
believe that his annual revenue amounted, in the season of his
greatest power, to a sum near ten times as large as that which
England yielded to Elizabeth. He had a standing army of fifty
thousand excellent . troops, at a time when England had not a
single battalion in constant pay. His ordinary naval force con-
sisted of a hundred and forty galleys. He held, what no other
prince in modern times has held, the dominion both of the land
and of the sea. During the greater part of his reign, he was
supreme on both elements. His soldiers marched up to the capi-
tal of France; his ships menaced the shores of England.

It is no exaggeration to say that during several years, his
power over Europe was greater than even that of Napoleon.
The influence of the French conqueror never extended beyond
low-water mark. The narrowest strait was to his power what it
was of old believed that a running stream was to the sorceries
of a witch. While his army entered every metropolis from
Moscow to Lisbon, the English fleets blockaded every port from
Dantzic to Trieste. Sicily, Sardinia, Majorca, Guernsey, enjoyed
security through the whole course of a war which endangered
every throne on the Continent. The victorious and imperial
nation which had filled its museums with the spoils of Antwerp,
of Florence, and of Rome, was suffering painfully from the want
of luxuries which use had made necessaries. While pillars and
arches were rising to commemorate the French conquests, the
conquerors were trying to manufacture coffee out of succory and
sugar out of beet-root. The influence of Philip on the Continent
was as great as that of Napoleon. The Emperor of Germany
was his kinsman. France, torn by religious dissensions, was
never a formidable opponent, and was sometimes a dependent
ally. At the same time, Spain had what Napoleon desired in
vain, — ships, colonies, and commerce. She long monopolized the
trade of America and of the Indian Ocean. All the gold of the
West, and all the spices of the East, were received and distributed
by her. During many years of war, her commerce was inter-
rupted only by the predatory enterprises of a few roving pri-
vateers. Even after the defeat of the Armada, English statesmen
continued to look with great dread on the maritime power of
Philip. « The King of Spain, » said the Lord Keeper to the two
Houses in 1593, <( since he hath usurped upon the kingdom of

9404 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

Portugal, hath thereby grown mighty by gaining the East Indies;
so as, how great soever he was before, he is now thereby mani-
festly more great. . . . He keepeth a navy armed to impeach
all trade of merchandise from England to Gascoigne and Guienne,
which he attempted to do this last vintage; so as he is now
become as a frontier enemy to all the west of England, as well
as all the south parts, as Sussex, Hampshire, and the Isle of
Wight. Yea, by means of his interest in St. Maloes, a port full of
shipping for the war, he is a dangerous neighbor to the Queen's
isles of Jersey and Guernsey, ancient possessions of this crown,
and never conquered in the greatest wars with France. »

The ascendency which Spain then had in Europe was in
one sense well deserved. It was an ascendency which had been
gained by unquestioned superiority in all the arts of policy and
of war. In the sixteenth century, Italy was not more decidedly
the land of the fine arts, Germany was not more decidedly the
land of bold theological speculation, than Spain was the land
of statesmen and of soldiers. The character which Virgil has
ascribed to his countrymen might have been claimed by the
grave and haughty chiefs who surrounded the throne of Ferdi-
nand the Catholic, and of his immediate successors. That majes-
tic art, "regere imperio populos," was not better understood
by the Romans in the proudest days of their republic than
by Gonsalvo and Ximenes, Cortez and Alva. The skill of the
Spanish diplomatists was renowned throughout Europe. In Eng-
land the name of Gondomar is still remembered. The sovereign
nation was unrivaled both in regular and irregular warfare.
The impetuous chivalry of France, the serried phalanx of Switz-
erland, were alike found wanting when brought face to face with
the Spanish infantry. In the wars of the New World, where
something different from ordinary strategy was required in the
general and something different from ordinary discipline in the
soldier, where it was every day necessary to meet by some new
expedient the varying tactics of a barbarous enemy, the Spanish
adventurers, sprung from the common people, displayed a fertility
of resource, and a talent for negotiation and command, to which
history scarcely affords a parallel.

The Castilian of those times was to the Italian what the Ro-
man, in the days of the greatness of Rome, was to the Greek.
The conqueror had less ingenuity, less taste, less delicacy of
perception, than the conquered; but far more pride, firmness, and

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9405

courage, a more solemn demeanor, a stronger sense of honor.
The subject had more subtlety in speculation, the ruler more
energy in action. The vices of the former were those of a
coward; the vices of the latter were those of a tyrant. It may
be added, that the Spaniard, like the Roman, did not disdain to
study the arts and the language of those whom he oppressed. A
revolution took place in the literature of Spain, not unlike that
revolution which, as Horace tells us, took place in the poetry of
Latium: <( Capta ferum victorem cepit.):> The slave took prisoner
the enslaver. The old Castilian ballads gave place to sonnets
in the style of Petrarch, and to heroic poems in the stanza of
Ariosto, as the national songs of Rome were driven out by imi-
tations of Theocritus and translations from Menander.

In no modern society, not even in England during the reign
of Elizabeth, has there been so great a number of men eminent
at once in literature and in the pursuits of active life, as Spain
produced during the sixteenth century. Almost every distin-
guished writer was also distinguished as a soldier and a politi-
cian. Boscan bore arms with high reputation. Garcilaso de Vega,
the author of the sweetest and most graceful pastoral poem of
modern times, after a short but splendid military career, fell
sword in hand at the head of a storming party. Alonzo de
Ercilla bore a conspicuous part in that war of Arauco which he
afterwards celebrated in one of the best heroic poems that Spain
has produced. Hurtado de Mendoza, whose poems have been
compared to those of Horace, and whose charming little novel is
evidently the model of Gil Bias, has been handed down to us by
history as one of the sternest of those iron proconsuls who were
employed by the House of Austria to crush the lingering pub-
lic spirit of Italy. Lope sailed in the Armada; Cervantes was
wounded at Lepanto.

It is curious to consider with how much awe our ancestors in
those times regarded a Spaniard. He was in their apprehension
a kind of daemon; horribly malevolent, but withal most sagacious
and powerful. (< They be verye wyse and politicke,^ says an
honest Englishman, in a memorial addressed to -Mary, <(and can>
thorowe ther wysdome, reform and brydell theyr owne natures
for a tyme, and applye their conditions to the manners of those
men with whom they meddell gladlye by friendshippe : whose
mischievous manners a man shall never knowe untyll he come
under ther subjection: but then shall he parfectlye parceyve and

9406

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

fele them; which thynge I praye God England never do: for
in dissimulations tin tyll they have ther purposes, and afterwards
in oppression and tyrannye when they can obtayne them, they
do exceed all other nations upon the earthe. >} This is just such
language as Arminius would have used about the Romans, or as
an Indian statesman of our times might use about the English.
It is the language of a man burning with hatred, but cowed by
those whom he hates; and painfully sensible of their superiority,
not only in power, but in intelligence.

THE CHARACTER OF CHARLES II. OF ENGLAND
From the Essay on Mackintosh's < History of the Revolution in England >

SUCH was England in 1660. In 1678 the whole face of things
had changed. At the former of those epochs eighteen years
of commotion had made the majority of the people ready to
buy repose at any price. At the latter epoch eighteen years of
misgovernment had made the same majority desirous to obtain
security for their liberties at any risk. The fury of their return-
ing loyalty had spent itself in its first outbreak. In a very few
months they had hanged and half -hanged, quartered and embow-
eled, enough to satisfy them. The Roundhead party seemed to
be not merely overcome, but too much broken and scattered ever
to rally again. Then -commenced the reflux of public opinion.
The nation began to find out to what a man it had intrusted
without conditions all its dearest interests, on what a man it had
lavished all its fondest affection.

On the ignoble nature of the restored exile, adversity had
exhausted all her discipline in vain. He had one immense
advantage over most other princes. Though born in the purple,
he was far better acquainted with the vicissitudes of life and the
diversities of character than most of his subjects. He had known
restraint, danger, penury, and dependence. He had often suffered
from ingratitude, insolence, and treachery. He had received many
signal proofs of faithful and heroic attachment. He had seen, if
ever man saw, both sides of human nature. But only one side
remained in his memory. He had learned only to despise and
to distrust his species; to consider integrity in men, and modesty
in women, as mere acting: nor did he think it worth while to
keep his opinion to himself. He was incapable of friendship; yet

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9407

he was perpetually led by favorites, without being in the small-
est degree duped by them. He knew that their regard to his
interests was all simulated; but from a certain easiness which had
no connection with humanity, he submitted, half laughing at him-
self, to be made the tool of any woman whose person attracted
him or of any man whose tattle diverted him. He thought
little and cared less about religion. He seems to have passed
his life in dawdling suspense between Hobbism and Popery.
He was crowned in his youth with the Covenant in his hand;
he died at last with the Host sticking in his throat; and dur-
ing most of the intermediate years was occupied in persecuting
both Covenanters and Catholics. He was not a tyrant from
the ordinary motiveSo He valued power for its own sake little,
and fame still less. He does not appear to have been vindictive,
or to have found any pleasing excitement in cruelty. What he
wanted was to be amused, to get through the twenty-four hours
pleasantly without sitting down to dry business. Sauntering
was, as Sheffield expresses it, the- true Sultana Queen of his
Majesty's affections. A sitting in council would have been insup-
portable to him if the Duke of Buckingham had not been there
to make mouths at the Chancellor. It has been said, and is
highly probable, that in his exile he was quite disposed to sell
his rights to Cromwell for a good round sum. To the last, his
only quarrel with his Parliaments was that they often gave him
trouble and would not always give him money. If there was a
person for whom he felt a real regard, that person was his
brother. If there was a point about which he really entertained
a scruple of conscience or of honor, that point was the descent
of the crown. Yet he was willing to consent to the Exclusion
Bill for six hundred thousand pounds; and the negotiation was
broken off only because he insisted on being paid beforehand.
To do him justice, his temper was good; his manners agreeable;
his natural talents above mediocrity. But he was sensual, frivo-
lous, false, and cold-hearted, beyond almost any prince of whom
history makes mention.

Under the government of such a man, the English people
could not be long in recovering from the intoxication of loyalty.

9408

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

THE CHURCH OF ROME

From the Essay on Ranke's < History of the Popes >

THERE is not, and there never was on the earth, a work of
human policy so well deserving of examination as the
Roman Catholic Church. The history of that Church joins
together the two great ages of human civilization. No other in-
stitution is left standing which carries the mind back to the times
when the smoke of sacrifice rose from the Pantheon, and when
camelopards and tigers bounded in the Flavian amphitheatre. The
proudest royal houses are but of yesterday, when compared with
the line of the Supreme Pontiffs. That line we trace back in an
unbroken series from the pope who crowned Napoleon in the
nineteenth century to the pope who crowned Pepin in the eighth;
and far beyond the time of Pepin the august dynasty extends, till
it is lost in the twilight of fable. The republic of Venice came
next in antiquity. But the republic of Venice was modern when
compared with the Papacy; and the republic of Venice is gone,
and the Papacy remains. The Papacy remains, not in decay, not
a mere antique, but full of life and useful vigor. The Catholic
Church is still sending forth to the farthest ends of the world
missionaries as zealous as those who landed in Kent with Augus-
tin, and still confronting hostile kings with the same spirit with
which she confronted Attila. The number of her children is
greater than in any former age. Her acquisitions in the New
World have more than compensated for what she has lost in the
Old. Her spiritual ascendency extends over the vast countries
which lie between the plains of the Missouri and Cape Horn,
countries which, a century hence, may not improbably contain
a population as large as that which now inhabits Europe. The
members of her communion are certainly not fewer than a hun-
dred and fifty millions; and it will be difficult to show that all
other Christian sects united amount to a hundred and twenty
millions. Nor do we see any sign which indicates that the term
of her long dominion is approaching. She saw the commence-
ment of all the governments and of all the ecclesiastical estab-
lishments that now exist in the world ; and we feel no assurance
that she is not destined to see the end of them all. She was
great and respected before the Saxon had set foot on Britain,
before the Frank had passed the Rhine, when Grecian eloquence
still flourished in Antioch, when idcls were still worshiped in the

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9409

temple of Mecca. And she may still exist in undiminished vigor
when some traveler from New Zealand shall, in the midst of a
vast solitude, take his stand on a broken arch of London Bridge
to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's.

We often hear it said that the world is constantly becoming
more and more enlightened, and that this enlightening must be
favorable to Protestantism and unfavorable to Catholicism. We
wish that we could think so. But we see great reason to doubt
whether this be a well-founded expectation. We see that during
the last two hundred and fifty years the human mind has been
in the highest degree active; that it has made great advances in
every branch of natural philosophy; that it has produced innu-
merable inventions tending to promote the convenience of life;
that medicine, surgery, chemistry, engineering, have been very
greatly improved; that government, police, and law have been
improved, though not to so great an extent as the physical sci-
ences. But we see that during these two hundred and fifty
years, Protestantism has made no conquests worth speaking of.
Nay, we believe that as far as there has been a change, that
change has on the whole been in favor of the Church of Rome.
We cannot, therefore, feel confident that the progress of knowl-
edge will necessarily be fatal to a system which has, to say the
least, stood its ground in spite of the immense progress made by
the human race in knowledge since the days of Queen Elizabeth.

Indeed, the argument which we are considering seems to us
to be founded on an entire mistake. There are branches of
knowledge with respect to which the law of the human mind
is progress. In mathematics, when once a proposition has been
demonstrated, it is never afterwards contested. Every fresh story
is as solid a basis for a new superstructure as the original
foundation was. Here, therefore, there is a constant addition to
the stock of truth. In the inductive sciences, again, the law is
progress. Every day furnishes new facts, and thus brings theory
nearer and nearer to perfection. There is no chance that either
in the purely demonstrative or in the purely experimental sci-
ences, the world will ever go back or even remain stationary.
Nobody ever heard of a reaction against Taylor's theorem, or
of a reaction against Harvey's doctrine of the circulation of the
blood.

But with theology the case is very different. As respects nat-
ural religion, — revelation being for the present altogether left ont

9410 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

of the question, — it is not easy to see that a philosopher of the
present day is more favorably situated than Thales or Simonides.
He has before him just the same evidences of design in the
structure of the universe which the early Greek had. We say
just the same; for the discoveries of modern astronomers and
anatomists have really added nothing to the force of that argu-
ment which a reflecting mind finds in every beast, bird, insect,
fish, leaf, flower, and shell. The reasoning by which Socrates,
in Xenophon's hearing, confuted the little atheist Aristodemus,
is exactly the reasoning 'of Paley's Natural Theology. Socrates
makes precisely the same use of the statues of Polycletus and the
pictures of Zeuxis which Paley makes of the watch. As to the
other great question, the question what becomes of man after
death, we do not see that a highly educated European, left to
his unassisted reason, is more likely to be in the right than a
Blackfoot Indian. Not a single one of the many sciences in
which we surpass the Blackfoot Indians throws the smallest light
on the state of the soul after the animal life is extinct. In truth,
all the philosophers, ancient and modern, who have attempted
without the help of revelation to prove the immortality of man,
from Plato down to Franklin, appear to us to have failed de-
plorably. . . .

Of the dealings of God with man, no more has been revealed
to the nineteenth century than to the first, or to London than to
the wildest parish in the Hebrides. It is true that in those
things which concern this life and this world, man constantly
becomes wiser and wiser. But it is no less true that, as respects
a higher power and a future state, man, in the language of
Goethe's scoffing fiend,

«bleibt stets von gleichem Schlag,
Und ist so wunderlich als wie am ersten Tag.w*

The history of Catholicism strikingly illustrates these observa-
tions. During the last seven centuries the public mind of Europe
has made constant progress in every department of secular knowl-
edge. But in religion we can trace no constant progress. The
ecclesiastical history of that long period is a history of movement
to and fro. Four times, since the authority of the Church of
Rome was established in Western Christendom, has the human

* « — remains always of the same stamp,
And is as unaccountable as on the first day.»

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 941 !

intellect • risen up against her yoke. Twice that Church remained
completely victorious. Twice she came forth from the conflict
bearing the marks of cruel wounds, but with the principle of life
still strong within her. When we reflect on the tremendous
assaults which she has survived, we find it difficult to conceive in
what way she is to perish.

LOYOLA AND THE JESUITS
From the Essay on Ranke's < History of the Popes >

IT is not, therefore, strange that the effect of the great outbreak
of Protestantism in one part of Christendom should have

been to produce an equally violent outbreak of Catholic zeal
in another. Two reformations were pushed on at once with
equal energy and effect: a reformation of doctrine in the North,
a reformation of manners and discipline in the South. In the
course of a single generation, the whole spirit of the Church of
Rome underwent a change. From the halls of the Vatican to
the most secluded hermitage of the Apennines, the great revival
was everywhere felt and seen. All the institutions anciently
devised for the propagation and defense of the faith were
furbished up and made efficient. Fresh engines of still more
formidable power were constructed. Everywhere old religious
communities were remodeled and new religious communities
called into existence. Within a year after the death of Leo, the
order of Camaldoli was purified. The Capuchins restored the old
Franciscan discipline, the midnight prayer and the life of silence.
The Barnabites and the society of Somasca devoted themselves.
to the relief and education of the poor. To the Theatine order
a still higher interest belongs. Its great object was the same,
with that of our early Methodists; namely, to supply the defi-
ciencies of the parochial clergy. The Church of Rome, wiser than
the Church of England, gave every countenance to the good
work. The members of the new brotherhood preached to great
multitudes in the streets and in the fields, prayed by the beds
of the sick, and administered the last sacraments to the dying.
Foremost among them in zeal and devotion was Gian Pietro
Caraffa, afterwards Pope Paul the Fourth.

In the convent of the Theatines at Venice, under the eye
of Caraffa, a Spanish gentleman took up his abode, tended the
poor in the hospitals, went about in rags, starved himself almost

94I2 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

to death, and often sallied into the streets, mounted on stones,
and waving his hat to invite the passers-by, began to preach in
a strange jargon of mingled Castilian and Tuscan. The Thea*
tines were among the most zealous and rigid of men: but to
this enthusiastic neophyte their discipline seemed lax, and their
movements sluggish; for his own mind, naturally passionate and
imaginative, had passed through a training which had given to
all its peculiarities a morbid intensity and energy. In his early
life he had been the very prototype of the hero of Cervantes.
The single study of the young Hidalgo had been chivalrous ro-
mance; and his existence had been one gorgeous day-dream of
princesses rescued and infidels subdued. He had chosen a Dul-
cinea, <(no countess, no duchess, >} — these are his own words,—
<( but one of far higher station ; w and he flattered himself with
the hope of laying at her feet the keys of Moorish castles and
the jeweled turbans of Asiatic kings.

In the midst of these visions of martial glory and prosper-
ous love, a severe wound stretched him on a bed of sickness.
His constitution was shattered, and he was doomed to be a crip-
ple for life. The palm of strength, grace, and skill in knightly
exercises, was no longer for him. He could no longer hope to
strike down gigantic soldans, or to find favor in the sight of
beautiful women. A new vision then arose in his mind, and
mingled itself with his own delusions in a manner which to most
Englishmen must seem singular, but which those who know how
close was the union between religion and chivalry in Spain will
be at no loss to understand. He would still be a soldier; he
would still be a knight-errant: but the soldier and knight-errant
of the spouse of Christ. He would smite the Great Red Dragon.
He would be the champion of the Woman clothed with the Sun.
He would break the charm under which false prophets held
the souls of men in bondage. His restless spirit led him to the
Syrian deserts and to the chapel of the Holy Sepulchre. Thence
he wandered back to the farthest West, and astonished the con-
vents of Spain and the schools of France by his penances and
vigils. The same lively imagination which had been employed in
picturing the tumult of unreal battles and the charms of unreal
queens, now peopled his solitude with saints and angels. The
Holy Virgin descended to commune with him. He saw the
Savior face to face with the eye of flesh. Even those mysteries
of religion which are the hardest trial of faith were in his case
palpable to sight. It is difficult to relate without a pitying smile

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

that in the sacrifice of the mass, he saw transubstantiation take
place; and that as he stood praying on the steps of the Church
of St. Dominic, he saw the Trinity in Unity, and wept aloud
with joy and wonder. Such was the celebrated Ignatius Loyola,
who in the great Catholic reaction bore the same part which
Luther bore in the great Protestant movement.

Dissatisfied with the system of the Theatines, the enthusiastic
Spaniard turned his face towards Rome. Poor, obscure, without
a patron, without recommendations, he entered the city where
now two princely temples, rich with painting and many-colored
marble, commemorate his great services to the Church; where
his form stands sculptured in massive silver; where his bones,
enshrined amidst jewels, are placed beneath the altar of God.
His activity and zeal bore down all opposition; and under his
rule the order of Jesuits began to exist, and grew rapidly to
the full measure of his gigantic powers. With what vehemence,
with what policy, with what exact discipline, with what dauntless
courage, with what self-denial, with what forgetfulness of the
dearest private ties, with what intense and stubborn devotion to
a single end, with what unscrupulous laxity and versatility in the
choice of means, the Jesuits fought the battle of their church,
is written in every page of the annals of Europe during several
generations. In the Order of Jesus was concentrated the quint-
essence of the Catholic spirit; and the history of the Order of
Jesus is the history of the great Catholic reaction. That order
possessed itself at once of all the strongholds which command the
public mind: of the pulpit, of the press, of the confessional, of
the academies. Wherever the Jesuit preached, the church was
too small for the audience. The name of Jesuit on a title-page
secured the circulation of a book. It was in the ears of the
Jesuit that the powerful, the noble, and the beautiful breathed
the secret history of their lives. It was at the feet of the Jesuit
that the youth of the higher and middle classes were brought
up from childhood to manhood, from the first rudiments to the
courses of rhetoric and philosophy. Literature and science, lately
associated with infidelity or with heresy, now became the allies
of orthodoxy.

Dominant in the South of Europe, the great order soon went
forth conquering and to conquer. In spite of oceans and deserts,
of hunger and pestilence, of spies and penal laws, of dungeons
and racks, of gibbets and quartering-blocks, Jesuits were to be

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

found under every disguise and in every country; scholars, phy
sicians, merchants, serving-men; in the hostile court of Sweden,
in the old manor-house of Cheshire, among the hovels of Con-
naught; arguing, instructing, consoling, stealing away the hearts
of the young, animating the courage of the timid, holding up
the crucifix before the eyes of the dying. Nor was it less their
office to plot against the thrones and lives of the apostate kings,
to spread evil rumors, to raise tumults, to inflame civil wars,
to arm the hand of the assassin. Inflexible in nothing but in
their fidelity to the Church, they were equally ready to appeal
in her cause to the spirit of loyalty and to the spirit of freedom.
Extreme doctrines of obedience and extreme doctrines of liberty;
the right of rulers to misgovern the people, the right of every
one of the people to plunge his knife in the heart of a bad ruler,
were inculcated by the same man, according as he addressed
nimself to the subject of Philip or to the subject of Elizabeth.
Some described these divines as the most rigid, others as the
most indulgent of spiritual directors; and both descriptions were
correct. The truly devout listened with awe to the high and
saintly morality of the Jesuit. The gay cavalier who had run his
rival through the body, the frail beauty who had forgotten her
marriage vow, found in the Jesuit an easy well-bred man of the
world, who knew how to make allowance for the little irregu-
larities of people of fashion. The confessor was strict or lax,
according to the temper of the penitent. The first object was to
drive no person out of the pale of the Church. Since there were
bad people, it was better that they should be bad Catholics than
bad Protestants. If a person was so unfortunate as to be a
bravo, a libertine, or a gambler, that was no reason for making
him a heretic too.

The Old World was not wide enough for this strange activ-
ity. The Jesuits invaded all the countries which the great mari-
time discoveries of the preceding age had laid open to European
enterprise. They were to be found in the depths of the Peru-
vian mines, at the marts of the African slave-caravans, on the
shores of the Spice Islands, in the observatories of China. They
made converts in regions which neither avarice nor curiosity had
tempted any of their countrymen to enter; and preached and dis-
puted in tongues of which no other native of the West understood
a word.

•

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 94! 5

THE REIGN OF TERROR

From the Essay on <Barere>

No GREAT party can be composed of such materials as these
[disinterested enthusiasts]. It is the inevitable law that
such zealots as we have described shall collect around them
a multitude of slaves, of cowards, and of libertines, whose savage
tempers and licentious appetites, withheld only by the dread of
Jaw and magistracy from the worst excesses, are called into full
activity by the hope of impunity. A faction which, from what-
ever motive, relaxes the great laws of morality, is certain to be
joined by the most immoral part of the community. This has
been repeatedly proved in religious wars. The war of the Holy
Sepulchre, the Albigensian war, the Huguenot war, the Thirty
Years' war, all originated in pious zeal. That zeal inflamed the
champions of the Church to such a point that they regarded all
generosity to the vanquished as a sinful weakness. The infidel,
the heretic, was to be run down like a mad dog. No outrage
committed by the Catholic warrior on the miscreant enemy could
deserve punishment,, As soon as it was known that boundless
license was thus given to barbarity and dissoluteness, thousands
of wretches who cared nothing for the sacred cause, but who
were eager to be exempted from the police of peaceful cities and
the discipline of well-governed camps, flocked to the standard of
the faith. The men who had set up that standard were sincere,
chaste, regardless of lucre, and perhaps, where only themselves
were concerned, not unforgiving; but round that standard were
assembled such gangs of rogues, ravishers, plunderers, and fero-
cious bravoes, as were scarcely ever found under the flag of any
State engaged in a mere temporal quarrel. In a very similar
way was the Jacobin party composed. There was a small nucleus
of enthusiasts; round that nucleus was gathered a vast mass
of ignoble depravity; and in all that mass there was nothing so
depraved and so ignoble as Barere.

Then came those days when the most barbarous of all
codes was administered by the most barbarous of all tribunals;
when no man could greet his neighbors, or say his prayers, or
dress his hair, without danger of committing a capital crime;
when spies lurked in every corner; when the guillotine was long
and hard at work every morning; when the jails were filled as

9416

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

close as the hold of a slave-ship; when the gutters ran foaming
with blood into the Seine; when it was death to be great-niece
of a captain of the royal guards, or half-brother of a doctor of
the Sorbonne, to express a doubt whether assignats would not
fall, to hint that the English had been victorious in the action
of the first of June, to have a copy of one of Burke's pamphlets
locked up in a desk, to laugh at a Jacobin for taking the name
of Cassius or Timoleon, or to call the Fifth Sans-culottide by its
old superstitious name of St. Matthew's Day. While the daily
wagon-loads of victims were carried to their doom through the
streets of Paris, the proconsuls whom the sovereign committee
had sent forth to the departments reveled in an extravagance of
cruelty unknown even in the capital. The knife of the deadly
machine rose and fell too slow for their work of slaughter. Long
rows of captives were mowed down with grape-shot. Holes were
made in the bottom of crowded barges. Lyons was turned into
a desert. At Arras even the cruel mercy of a speedy death was
denied to the prisoners. All down the Loire, from Saumur to
the sea, great flocks of crows and kites feasted on naked corpses,
twined together in hideous embraces. No mercy was shown to
sex or age. The number of young lads and of girls of seven-
teen who were murdered by that execrable government is to be
reckoned by hundreds. Babies torn from the breast were tossed
from pike to pike along the Jacobin ranks. One champion of
liberty had his pockets well stuffed with ears. Another swag-
gered about with the finger of a little child in his hat. A few
months had sufficed to degrade France below the level of New
Zealand.

It is absurd to say that "any amount of public danger can
justify a system like this, we do not say on Christian principles,
we do not say on the principles of a high morality, but even on
principles of Machiavellian policy. It is true that great emer-
gencies call for activity and vigilance; it is true that they justify
severity which, in ordinary times, would deserve the name of
cruelty. But indiscriminate severity can never, under any cir-
cumstances, be useful. It is plain that the whole efficacy of
punishment depends on the care with which the guilty are dis-
tinguished. Punishment which strikes the guilty and the innocent
promiscuously operates merely like a pestilence or a great con-
vulsion of nature, and has no more tendency to prevent offenses
than the cholera, or an earthquake like that of Lisbon, would

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

have. The energy for which the Jacobin administration is praised
was merely the energy of the Malay who maddens himself with
opium, draws his knife, and runs a-muck through the streets,
slashing right and left at friends and foes. Such has never been
the energy of truly great rulers; of Elizabeth, for example, of
Oliver, or of Frederick. They were not, indeed, scrupulous. But
had they been less scrupulous than they were, the strength and
amplitude of their minds would have preserved them from crimes
such as those which the small men of the Committee of Public
Safety took for daring strokes of policy. The great Queen who
so long held her own against foreign and domestic enemies,
against temporal and spiritual arms; the great Protector who gov-
erned with more than regal power, in despite both of royalists
and republicans; the great King who, with a beaten army and
an exhausted treasury, defended his little dominions to the last
against the united efforts of Russia, Austria, and France, — with
what scorn would they have heard that it was impossible for
them to strike a salutary terror into the disaffected without send-
ing schoolboys and schoolgirls to death by cart-loads and boat-
loads !

The popular notion is, we believe, that the leading Terrorists
were wicked men, but at the same time great men. We can see
nothing great about them but their wickedness. That their policy
was daringly original is a vulgar error. Their policy is as old
as the oldest accounts which we have of human misgovernment.
It seemed new in France and in the eighteenth century only
because it had been long disused, for excellent reasons, by the
enlightened part of mankind. But it has always prevailed, and
still prevails, in savage and half-savage nations, and is the chief
cause which prevents such nations from making advances towards
civilization. Thousands of deys, of beys, of pachas, of rajahs, of
nabobs, have shown themselves as great masters of statecraft as
the members of the Committee of Public Safety. Djezzar, we
imagine, was superior to any of them in their new line. In fact,
there is not a petty tyrant in Asia or Africa so dull or so un-
learned as not to be fully qualified for the business of Jacobin
police and Jacobin finance. To behead people by scores without
caring whether they are guilty or innocent, to wring money
out of the rich by the help of jailers and executioners; to rob
the public creditor, and to put him to death if he remonstrates;
to take loaves by force out of the bakers' shops; to clothe and

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

mount soldiers by seizing on one man's wool and linen, and on
another man's horses and saddles, without compensation, — is of
all modes of governing the simplest and most obvious. Of its
morality we at present say nothing. But surely it requires no
capacity beyond that of a barbarian or a child.

By means like those which we have described, the Commit-
tee of Public Safety undoubtedly succeeded, for a short time, in
enforcing profound submission and in raising immense funds.
But to enforce submission by butchery, and to raise funds by spo-
liation, is not statesmanship. The real statesman is he who,
in troubled times, keeps down the turbulent without unnecessa-
rily harassing the well-affected; and who, when great pecuniary
resources are needed, provides for the public exigencies without
violating the security of property and drying up the sources of
future prosperity. Such a statesman, we are confident, might in
1793 have preserved the independence of France without shed-
ding a drop of innocent blood, without plundering a single ware-
house. Unhappily, the republic was subject to men who were
mere demagogues and in no sense statesmen. They could declaim
at a club. They could lead a rabble to mischief. But they had
no skill to conduct the affairs of an empire. The want of skill
they supplied for a time by atrocity and blind violence. For
legislative ability, fiscal ability, military ability, diplomatic ability,
they had one substitute, — the guillotine. Indeed, their exceeding
ignorance and the barrenness of their invention are the best
excuse for their murders and robberies. We really believe that
they would not have cut so many throats and picked so many
pockets, if they had known how to govern in any other way.

That under their administration the war against the European
coalition was successfully conducted, is true. But that war had
been successfully conducted before their elevation, and continued
to be successfully conducted after their fall. Terror was not the
order of the day when Brussels opened its gates to Dumourier.
Terror had ceased to be the order of the day when Piedmont
and Lombardy were conquered by Bonaparte. The truth is, that
France was saved, not by the Committee of Public Safety, but by
the energy, patriotism, and valor of the French people. Those
high qualities were victorious in spite of the incapacity of rulers
whose administration was a tissue, not merely of crimes, but of
blunders.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

9419

THE TRIAL OF WARREN HASTINGS
From the Essay on Gleig's < Memoirs of Warren Hastings >

IN THE mean time, the preparations for the trial had proceeded
rapidly; and on the thirteenth of February, 1788, 'the sittings
of the Court commenced. There have been spectacles more
dazzling to the eye, more gorgeous with jewelry and cloth of
gold, more attractive to grown-up children, than that which was
then exhibited at Westminster; but perhaps there never was a
spectacle so well calculated to strike a highly cultivated, a reflect-
ing, an imaginative mind. All the various kinds of interest which
belong to the near and to the distant, to the present and to the
past, were collected on one spot and in one hour. All the talents
and all the accomplishments which are developed by liberty and
civilization were now displayed, with every advantage that could
be derived both from co-operation and from contrast. Every step
in the proceedings carried the mind either backward, through
many troubled centuries, to the days when the foundations of
our constitution were laid; or far away, over boundless seas and
deserts, to dusky nations living under strange stars, worshiping
strange gods, and writing strange characters from right to left,
The High Court of Parliament was to sit, according to forms
handed down from the days of the Plantagenets, on an English-
man accused of exercising tyranny over the lord of the holy city
of Benares, and over the ladies of the princely house of Oude.

The place was worthy of such a trial. It was the great hall
of William Rufus, the hall which had resounded with acclamations
at the inauguration of thirty kings, the hall which had witnessed
the just sentence of Bacon and the just absolution of Somers,
the hall where the eloquence of Stafford had for a moment awed
and melted a victorious party inflamed with just resentment, the
hall where Charles had confronted the High Court of Justice
with the placid courage which has half redeemed his fame.
Neither military nor civil pomp was wanting. The avenues were
lined with grenadiers. The streets were kept clear by cavalry.
The peers, robed in gold and ermine, were marshaled by the
heralds under Garter King-at-arms. The judges in their vest-
ments of state attended to give advice on points of law. Near a
hundred and seventy lords, three-fourths of the Upper House as
the Upper House then was, walked in solemn order from their

p420 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

usual place of assembling to the tribunal. The junior baron
present led the way, — George Elliot, Lord Heathfield, recently
ennobled for his memorable defense of Gibraltar against the fleets
and armies of France and Spain. The long procession was closed
by the Duke of Norfolk, Earl Marshal of the realm, by the great
dignitaries, and by the brothers and sons of the King. Last of
all came the Prince of Wales, conspicuous by his fine person and
noble bearing. The gray old walls were hung with scarlet. The
long galleries were crowded by an audience such as has rarely
excited the fears or the emulations of an orator. There were
gathered together, from all parts of a great, free, enlightened, and
prosperous empire, grace and female loveliness, wit and learning,
the representatives of every science and of every art. There
were seated round the Queen the fair-haired young daughters of
the House of Brunswick. There the ambassadors of great kings
and commonwealths gazed with admiration on a spectacle which
no other country in the world could present. There Siddons, in
the prime of her majestic beauty, looked with emotion on a scene
surpassing all the imitations of the stage. There the historian of
the Roman Empire thought of the days when Cicero pleaded the
cause of Sicily against Verres, and when, before a Senate which
still retained some show of freedom, Tacitus thundered against
the oppressor of Africa. There were seen side by side the great-
est painter and the greatest scholar of the age. The spectacle
had allured Reynolds from that easel which has preserved to us
the thoughtful foreheads of so many writers and statesmen, and
the sweet smiles of so many noble matrons. It had induced
Parr to suspend his labors in that dark and profound mine from
which he had extracted a vast treasure of erudition; a treasure
too often buried in the earth, too often paraded with injudicious
and inelegant ostentation, but still precious, massive, and splen-
did. There appeared the voluptuous charms of her to whom the
heir of the throne had in secret plighted his faith. There too
was she, the beautiful mother of a beautiful race, the St. Cecilia
whose delicate features, lighted up by love and music, art has
rescued from the common decay. There were the members of
that brilliant society which quoted, criticized, and exchanged rep-
artees, under the rich peacock hangings of Mrs. Montague. And
there the ladies whose lips, more persuasive than those of Fox
himself, had carried the Westminster election against palace and
treasury, shone around Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9421

The Serjeants made proclamation. Hastings advanced to the
bar, and bent his knee. The culprit was indeed not unworthy of
that great presence. He had ruled an extensive and populous
country, had made laws. and treaties, had sent forth armies, had
set up and pulled down princes. And in his high place he had
so borne himself that all had feared him, that most had loved
him, and that hatred itself could deny him no title to glory
except virtue. He looked like a great man, and not like a bad
man. A person small and emaciated, yet deriving dignity from a
carriage which while it indicated deference to the court, indicated
also habitual self-possession and self-respect, a high and intellect-
ual forehead, a brow pensive but not gloomy, a mouth of inflex-
ible decision, a face pale and worn but serene, on which was
written, as legibly as under the picture in the council chamber at
Calcutta, Mens <zqua in arduis: such was the aspect with which
the great proconsul presented himself to his judges.

His counsel accompanied him, — men all of whom were after-,
wards raised by their talents and learning to the highest posts in
their profession: the bold and strong-minded Law, afterwards
Chief Justice of the King's Bench; the more humane and elo-
quent Dallas, afterwards Chief Justice of the Common Pleas; and
Plomer, who near twenty years later successfully conducted in
the same high court the defense of Lord Melville, and subse-
quently became Vice-Chancellor and Master of the Rolls.

But neither the' culprit nor his advocates attracted so much
notice as the accusers. In the midst of the blaze of red drapery,
a space had been fitted up with green benches and tables for the
Commons. The managers, with Burke at their head, appeared in
full dress. The collectors of gossip did not fail to remark that
even Fox, generally so regardless of his appearance, had paid
to the illustrious tribunal the compliment of wearing a bag and
sword. Pitt had refused to be one of the conductors of the
impeachment; and his commanding, copious, and sonorous elo-
quence was wanting to that great muster of various talents. Age
and blindness had unfitted Lord North for the duties of a public
prosecutor; and his friends were left without the help of his
excellent sense, his tact, and his urbanity. But in spite of the
absence of these two distinguished members of the lower House,
the box in which the managers stood contained an array of speak-
ers such as perhaps had not appeared together since the great

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

age of Athenian eloquence. There were Fox and Sheridan, the
English Demosthenes and the English Hyperides, There was
Burke, — ignorant indeed, or negligent, of the art of adapting his
reasonings and his style to the capacity and taste of his hearers,
but in amplitude of comprehension and richness of imagination
superior to every orator, ancient or modern. There, ' with eyes
reverentially fixed on Burke, appeared the finest gentleman of the
age, his form developed by every manly exercise, his face beam-
ing with intelligence and spirit, — the ingenious, the chivalrous,
the high-souled Windham. Nor, though surrounded by such men,
did the youngest manager pass unnoticed. At an age when most
of those who distinguish themselves in life are still contending
for prizes and fellowships at college, he had won for himself a
conspicuous place in Parliament. No advantage of fortune or
connection was wanting that could set off to the height his splen-
did talents and his unblemished honor. At twenty-three he had
been thought worthy to be ranked with the veteran statesmen who
appeared as the delegates of the British Commons, at the bar of
the British nobility. All who stood at that bar, save him alone,
are gone, — culprit, advocates, accusers. To the generation which is
now in the vigor of life, he is the sole representative of a great
age which has passed away. But those who within the last ten
years have listened with delight, till the morning sun shone on
the tapestries of the House of Lords, to the lofty and animated
eloquence of Charles, Earl Grey, are able to 'form some estimate
of the powers of a race of men among whom he was not the
foremost.

HORATIUS
A LAY MADE ABOUT THE YEAR OF THE CITY CCCLX

LARS PORSENA of
By the Nine Gods he swore
That the great house of Tarquin
Should suffer wrong no more.
By the Nine Gods he swore it,
And named a trysting day,

And bade his messengers ride forth,
East and west and south and north.
To summon his array.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9423

East and west and south and north

The messengers ride fast,
And tower and town and cottage

Have heard the trumpet's blast.
Shame on the false Etruscan

Who lingers in his home,
When Porsena of Clusium

Is on the march for Rome.

The horsemen and the footmen

Are pouring in amain
From many a stately market-place,

From many a fruitful plain;
From many a lonely hamlet,

Which, hid by beech and pine,
Like an eagle's nest hangs on the crest

Of purple Apennine;

From lordly Volaterrae,

Where scowls the far-famed hold
Piled by the hands of giants

For godlike kings of old;
From seagirt Populonia,

Whose sentinels descry
Sardinia's snowy mountain-tops

Fringing the southern sky;

From the proud mart of Pisee,

Queen of the western waves,
Where ride Massilia's triremes,

Heavy with fair-haired slaves;
From where sweet Clanis wanders

Through corn and vines and flowers;
From where Cortona lifts to heaven

Her diadem of towers.

Tall are the oaks whose acorns

Drop in dark Auser's rill;
Fat are the stags that champ the boughs

Of the Ciminian hill;
Beyond all streams Clitumnus

Is to the herdsman dear;
Best of all pools the fowler loves

The great Volsinian mere.

9424 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

But now no stroke of woodman

Is heard by Auser's rill;
No hunter tracks the stag's green path

Up the Ciminian hill;
Unwatched along Clitumnus

Grazes the milk-white steer;
Unharmed the water-fowl may dip

In the Volsinian mere.

The harvests of Arretium,

This year, old men shall reap;
This year, young boys in Umbro

Shall plunge the struggling sheep;
And in the vats of Luna,

This year, the must shall foam
Round the white feet of laughing girls

Whose sires have marched to. Rome,

There be thirty chosen prophets,

The wisest of the land,
Who alway by Lars Porsena

Both morn and evening stand;
Evening and morn the Thirty

Have turned the verses o'er,
Traced from the right on linen white

By mighty seers of yore.

And with one voice the Thirty

Have their glad answer given: —
wGo forth, go forth, Lars Porsena j

Go forth, beloved of Heaven;
Go, and return in glory

To Clusium's royal dome;
And hang round Nurscia's altars

The golden shields of Rome.)}

And now hath every city

Sent up her tale of men;
The foot are fourscore thousand,

The horse are thousands ten.
Before the gates of Sutrium

Is met the great array:
A proud man was Lars Porsena

Upon the trysting day.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9425

For all the Etruscan armies

Were ranged beneath his eye
And many a banished Roman,

And many a stout ally;
And with a mighty following

To join the muster came
The Tusculan Mamilius,

Prince of the Latian name.

But by the yellow Tiber

Was tumult and affright:
From all the spacious champaign

To Rome men took their flight.
A mile around the city,

The throng stopped up the ways;
A fearful sight it was to see

Through two long nights and days.

For aged folks on crutches,

And women great with child,
And mothers sobbing over babes

That clung to them and smiled,
And sick men borne in litters

High on the necks of slaves.
And troops of sunburned husbandmen

With reaping-hooks and staves, .

And droves of mules and asses

Laden with skins of wine,
And endless flocks of goats and sheep,

And endless herds of kine,
And endless trains of wagons

That creaked beneath the weight
Of corn sacks and of household goods,

Choked every roaring gate.

Now, from the rock Tarpeian,

Could the wan burghers spy
The line of blazing villages

Red in the midnight sky.
The Fathers of the City,

They sat all night and day,
For every hour some horseman came

With tidings of dismay.

9426 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

To eastward and to westward

Have spread the Tuscan bands;
Nor house, nor fence, nor dovecote

In Crustumerium stands.
Verbenna down to Ostia

Hath wasted all the plain;
Astur hath stormed Janiculum,

And the stout guards are slain.

Iwis, in all the Senate,

There was no heart so bold,

But sore it ached and fast it beat,
When that ill news was told.

Forthwith up rose the Consul,
Up rose the Fathers all;

In haste they girded up their gowns,
And hied them to the wall.

They held a council standing

Before the River-Gate:
Short time was there, ye well may guess,

For musing or debate.
Out spake the Consul roundly: —

<( The bridge must straight go down ;
For since Janiculum is lost,

Naught else can save the town."

Just then a scout came flying,

All wild with haste and fear: —
<(To arms! to arms! Sir Consul:

Lars Porsena is here."
On the low hills to westward

The Consul fixed his eye,
And saw the swarthy storm of dust

Rise fast along the sky.

And nearer fast and nearer

Doth the red whirlwind come;
And louder still and still more loud,
From underneath that rolling cloud,
Is heard the trumpet's war-note proud,

The trampling and the hum.
And plainly and more plainly

Now through the gloom appears,

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9427

Far to left and far to right,
In broken gleams of dark-blue light,
The long array of helmets bright,
The long array of spears.

And plainly and more plainly,

Above that glimmering line,
Now might ye see the banners

Of twelve fair cities shine;
But the banner of proud Clusium

Was highest of them all,
The terror of the Umbrian,

The terror of the Gaul.

And plainly and more plainly

Now might the burghers know,
By port and vest, by horse and crest,

Each warlike Lucumo.
There Cilnius of Arretium

On his fleet roan was seen;
And Astur of the fourfold shield,
Girt with the brand none else may wield,
Tolumnius with the belt of gold,
And dark Verbenna from the hold

By reedy Thrasymene.

Fast by the royal standard,

O'erlooking all the war,
Lars Porsena of Clusium

Sat in his ivory car.
By the right wheel rode Mamilius,

Prince of the Latian name;
And by the left false Sextus,

That wrought the deed of shame.

But when the face of Sextus

Was seen among the foes,
A yell that rent the firmament

From all the town arose.
On the housetops was no woman

But spat towards him and hissed;
No child but screamed out curses,

And shook its little fist.

But the Consul's brow was sad,

And the Consul's speech was low.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

And darkly looked he at the wall,

And darkly at the foe.
ft Their van will be upon us

Before the bridge goes down;
And if they once may win the bridge,

What hope to save the town?"

Then out spake brave Horatius,

The captain of the gate: —
«To every man upon this earth

Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better

Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,

And the temples of his gods;

(<And for the tender mother

Who dandled him to rest;
And for the wife who nurses

His baby at her breast;
And for the holy maidens

Who feed the eternal flame,
To save them from false Sextus

That wrought the deed of shame?

aHew down the bridge, Sir Consul,

With all the speed ye may;
1, with two more to help me,

Will hold the foe in play.
In yon strait path a thousand

May well be stopped by three:
Now who will stand on either hand,

And keep the bridge with me ? w

Then out spake Spurius Lartius —

A Ramnian proud was he:
*Lo, I will stand at thy right hand.

And keep the bridge with thee.°
And out spake strong Herminius —

Of Titian blood was he:
<*I will abide on thy left side,

And keep the bridge with thee."

* Horatius, w quoth the Consul,
<( As thou sayest, so let it be.w

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9429

And straight against that great array

Forth went the dauntless Three.
For Romans in Rome's quarrel

Spared neither land nor gold,
Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life,

In the brave days of old.

Then none was for a party;

Then all were for the State;
Then the great man helped the poor,

And the poor man loved the great:
Then lands were fairly portioned;

Then spoils were fairly sold:
The Romans were like brothers

In the brave days of old.

Now Roman is to Roman

More hateful than a foe,
And the. Tribunes beard the high,

And the Fathers grind the low.
As we wax hot in faction,

In battle we wax cold;
Wherefore men fight not as they fought

In the brave days of old.

Now while the Three were tightening

Their harness on their backs,
The Consul was the foremost man

To take in hand an axe ;
And Fathers mixed with Commons

Seized hatchet, bar, and crow,
And smote upon the planks above,

And loosed the props below.

Meanwhile the Tuscan army,

Right glorious to behold,
Came flashing back the noonday light,
Rank behind rank, like surges bright

Of a broad sea of gold.
Four hundred trumpets sounded

A peal of warlike glee,
As that great host, with measured tread,
And spears advanced, and ensigns spread,
Rolled slowly towards the bridge's head,

Where stood the dauntless Three.

9430 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

The Three stood calm and silent,

And looked upon the foes,
And a great shout of laughter

From all the vanguard rose:
And forth three chiefs came spurring

Before that deep array;

To earth they sprang, their swords they drew,
And lifted high their shields, and flew

To win the narrow way:

Aunus from green Tifernum,

Lord of the Hill of Vines;
And Seius, whose eight hundred slaves

Sicken in Ilva's mines;
And Picus, long to Clusium

Vassal in peace and war,
Who led to fight his Umbrian powers
From that gray crag where, girt with towers,
The fortress of Nequinum lowers

O'er the pale waves of Nar.

Stout Lartius hurled down Aunus

Into the stream beneath;
Herminius struck at Seius,

And clove him to the teeth;
At Picus brave Horatius

Darted one fiery thrust,
And the proud Umbrian's gilded arms

Clashed in the bloody dust.

Then Ocnus of Falerii

Rushed on the Roman Three;
And Lausulus of Urgo,

The rover of the sea;
And Aruns of Volsinium,

Who slew the great wild boar —
The great wild boar that had his den
Amidst the reeds of Cosa's fen,
And wasted fields, and slaughtered men,

Along Albinia's shore.

Herminius smote down Aruns;

Lartius laid Ocnus low:
Right to the heart of Lausulus

Horatius sent a blow.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 943 *

aLie there," he cried, "fell pirate!

No more, aghast and pale,
From Ostia's walls the crowd shall mark
The track of thy destroying bark.
No more Campania's hinds shall fly
To woods and caverns when they spy

Thy thrice accursed sail.®

But now no sound of laughter,

Was heard among the foes;
A wild and wrathful clamor

From all the vanguard rose.
Six spears'-lengths from the entrance

Halted that deep array,
And for a space no man came forth

To win the narrow way.

But hark! the cry is "Astur!"

And lo! the ranks divide;
And the great Lord of Luna

Comes with his stately stride.
Upon his ample shoulders

Clangs loud the fourfold shield,
And in his hand he shakes the brand

Which none but he can wield.

He smiled on those bold Romans

A smile serene and high;
He eyed the flinching Tuscans,

And scorn was in his eye.
Quoth he, (<The she-wolf's litter

Stand savagely at bay;
But will ye dare to follow,

If Astur clears the way?w

Then, whirling up his broadsword

With both hands to the height,
He rushed against Horatius,

And smote with all his might.
With shield and blade Horatius

Right deftly turned the blow.
The blow, though turned, came yet too nigh:
It missed his helm, but gashed his thigh;
The Tuscans raised a joyful cry

To see the red blood flow.

9432 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

He reeled, and on Herminius

He leaned one breathing-space:
Then, like a wild-cat mad with wounds,

Sprang right at Astur's face;
Through teeth, and skull, and helmet,

So fierce a thrust he sped,
The good sword stood a hand-breadth out

Behind the Tuscan's head.

And the great Lord of Luna

Fell at that deadly stroke,
As falls on Mount Alvernus

A thunder-smitten oak.
Far o'er the crashing forest

The giant arms lie spread;
And the pale augurs, muttering low,

Gaze on the blasted head.

On Astur's throat Horatius

Right firmly pressed his heel,
And thrice and four times tugged amain,

Ere he wrenched out the steel.
<(And see,** he cried, (<the welcome,

Fair guests, that waits you here!
What noble Lucumo comes next

To taste our Roman cheer ?w

But at his haughty challenge

A sullen murmur ran,
Mingled of wrath, and shame, and dread,

Along that glittering van.
There lacked not men of prowess,

Nor men of lordly race;
For all Etruria's noblest

Were round the fatal place.

But all Etruria's noblest

Felt their hearts sink to see
On the earth the bloody corpses,

In the path the dauntless Three:
And from the ghastly entrance

Where those bold Romans stood,
All shrank, like boys who unaware,
Ranging the woods to start a hare,
Come to the mouth of the dark lair

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9433

Where, growling low, a fierce old bear
Lies amidst bones and blood.

Was none who would be foremost

To lead such dire attack;
But those behind cried (( Forward ! »

And those before cried « Back ! »
And backward now and forward

Wavers the deep array;
And on the tossing sea of steel,
To and fro the standards reel;
And the victorious trumpet-peal

Dies fitfully away.

Yet one man for one moment

Stood out before the crowd;
Well known was he to all the Three,

And they gave him greeting loud: —
<( Now welcome, welcome, Sextus!

Now welcome to thy home !
"Why dost thou stay, and turn away?

Here lies the road to Rome."

Thrice looked he at the city;

Thrice looked he at the dead;
And thrice came on in fury,

And thrice turned back in dread;
And, white with fear and hatred,

Scowled at the narrow way
Where, wallowing in a pool of blood,

The bravest Tuscans lay.

But meanwhile axe and lever

Have manfully been plied;
And now the bridge hangs tottering

Above the boiling tide.
<( Come back, come back, Horatius ! w

Loud cried the Fathers all.
(< Back, Lartius ! back, Herminius !

Back, ere the ruin fall!"

Back darted Spurius Lartius;

Herminius darted back:
And as they passed, beneath their feet

They felt the timbers crack.

9434 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

But when they turned their faces,
And on the farther shore

Saw brave Horatius stand alone,

They would have crossed once more

But with a crash like thunder

Fell every loosened beam,
And like a dam, the mighty wreck

Lay right athwart the stream:
And a long shout of triumph

Rose from the walls of Rome,
As to the highest turret-tops

Was splashed the yellow foam.

And like a horse unbroken

When first he feels the rein,
The furious river struggled hard,

And tossed his tawny mane,
And burst the curb, and bounded,

Rejoicing to be free,
And whirling down, in fierce career,

Battlement and plank and pier,
Rushed headlong to the sea,

Alone stood brave Horatius,

But constant still in mind;
Thrice thirty thousand foes before,

And the broad flood behind.
(< Down with him ! >} cried false Sextus,

With a smile on his pale face.
<(Now yield thee," cried Lars Porsena,

ttNow yield thee to our grace. >J

Round turned he, as not deigning

Those craven ranks to see;
Naught spake he to Lars Porsena,

To Sextus naught spake he:
But he saw on Palatinus

The white porch of his home;
And he spake to the noble river

That rolls by the towers of Rome.

«O Tiber! father Tiber!

To whom the Romans pray;
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms

Take thou in charge this day!w

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY 9435

So he spake, and speaking sheathed

The good sword by his side,
And with his harness on his back,

Plunged headlong in the tide.

No sound of joy or sorrow

Was heard from either bank;
But friends and foes, in dumb surprise,
With parted lips and straining eyes,

Stood gazing where he sank;
And when above the surges

They saw his crest appear,
All Rome sent forth a rapturous cry,
And even the ranks of Tuscany

Could scarce forbear to cheer.

But fiercely ran the current,

Swollen high by months of rain:
And fast his blood was flowing;

And he was sore in pain,
And heavy with his armor,

And spent with changing blows:
And oft they thought him sinking,

But still again he rose.

Never, I ween, did swimmer,

In such an evil case,
Struggle through such a raging flood

Safe to the landing-place;
But his limbs were borne up bravely

By the brave heart within,
And our good father Tiber

Bore bravely up his chin.

"Curse on him!" quoth false Sextus;

(< Will not the villain drown ?
But for this stay; ere close of day

We should have sacked the town ! *
(< Heaven help him ! }> quoth Lars Porsena,

<(And bring him safe to shore;
For such a gallant feat of arms

Was never seen before."

And now he feels the bottom;

Now on dry earth he stands;
Now round him throng the Fathers

To press his gory hands;

9436 THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAT

And now, with shouts and clapping,
And noise of weeping loud,

He enters through the River-Gate,
Borne by the joyous crowd.

They gave him of the corn-land,

That was of public right,
As much as two strong oxen

Could plow from morn till night;
And they made a molten image,

And set it up on high,
And there it stands unto this day

To witness if I lie.

It stands in the Comitium,

Plain for all folk to see, — •

Horatius in his harness,

Halting upon one knee;
And underneath is written,

In letters all of gold,
How valiantly he kept the bridge

In the brave days of old.

And still his name sounds stirring

Unto the men of Rome,
As the trumpet-blast that cries to them

To charge the Volscian home;
And wives still pray to Juno

For boys with hearts as bold
As his who kept the bridge so well

In the brave days of old.

And in the nights of winter,

When the cold north winds blow,
And the long howling of the wolves

Is heard amidst the snow;
When round the lonely cottage

Roars loud the tempest's din,
And the good logs of Algidus

Roar louder yet within;

When the oldest cask is opened,
And the largest lamp is lit;

When the chestnuts glow in the embers,
And the kid turns on the spit;

When young and old in circle
Around the firebrands close;

THOMAS BABINGTCJN MACAULAY 9437

When the girls are weaving baskets,
And the lads are shaping bows;

When the goodman mends his armor,

And trims his helmet's plume;
When the goodwife's shuttle merrily

Goes flashing through the loom; —
With weeping and with laughter

Still is the story told,
How well Horatius kept the bridge

In the brave days of old.

THE BATTLE OF IVRY

[Henry the Fourth, on his accession to the French crown, was opposed by
a large part of his subjects under the Duke of Mayenne, with the assistance
of Spain and Savoy. In March 1590 he gained a decisive victory over that
party at Ivry. Before the battle, he addressed his troops — «My children, if
you lose sight of your colors, rally to my white plume: you will always find
it in the path to honor and glory. w His conduct was answerable to his prom-
ise. Nothing could resist his impetuous valor, and the Leaguers underwent a
total and bloody defeat. In the midst of the rout, Henry followed, crying,
«Save the French !» and his clemency added a number of the enemies to his
own army.]

Now glory to the Lord of Hosts, from whom all glories are!
And glory to our Sovereign liege, King Henry of Navarre!
Now let there be the merry sound of music and the dance,
Through thy cornfields green and sunny vines, O pleasant land of

France !

And thou, Rochelle, our own Rochelle, proud city of the waters,
Again let rapture light the eyes of all thy mourning daughters.
As thou wert constant in our ills, be joyous in our joy,
For cold, and stiff, and still are they who wrought thy walls annoy.
Hurrah! hurrah! a single field hath turned the chance of war;
Hurrah! hurrah! for Ivry, and King Henry of Navarre!

Oh, how our hearts were beating, when, at the dawn of day,
We saw the army of the League drawn out in long array,
With all its priest-led citizens, and all its rebel peers,
And Appenzell's stout infantry, and Egmont's Flemish spears.
There rode the brood of false Lorraine, the curses of our land ;
And dark Mayenne was in the midst, a truncheon in his hand:
And as we looked on them, we thought of Seine's empurpled flood,
And good Coligny's hoary hair all dabbled with his blood;

9438

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

And we cried unto the living God, who rules the fate of war,
To fight for his own holy name and Henry of Navarre.

The King is come to marshal us, in all his armor drest,

And he has bound a snow-white plume upon his gallant crest;

He looked upon his people, and a tear was in his eye;

He looked upon the traitors, and his glance was stern and high.

Right graciously he smiled on us, as rolled from wing to wing,

Down all our line, in deafening shout, <( God save our lord, the King!*

(<And if my standard-bearer fall, as fall full well he may, —

For never saw I promise yet of such a bloody fray, —

Press where ye see my white plume shine, amidst the ranks of war.

And be your oriflamme to-day the helmet of Navarre. w

Hurrah! the foes are moving. Hark to the mingled din

Of fife, and steed, and trump, and drum, and roaring culverin!

The fiery Duke is pricking fast across St. Andre's plain,

With all the hireling chivalry of Guelders and Almayne.

Now by the lips of those ye love, fair gentlemen of France.

Charge for the golden lilies now — upon them with the lance!

A thousand spurs are striking deep, a thousand spears in rest,

A thousand knights are pressing close behind the snow-white crest;

And in they burst, and on they rushed, while, like a guiding star,

Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of Navarre.

Now, God be praised, the day is ours ! Mayenne hath turned his rein ,
D'Aumale hath cried for quarter; the Flemish Count is slain;
Their ranks are breaking like, thin clouds before a Biscay gale;
The field is heaped with bleeding steeds, and flags and cloven mail.
And then we thought on vengeance, and all along our van,
« Remember St. Bartholomew, » was passed from man to man:
But out spake gentle Henry then, (<No Frenchman is my foe;
Down, down with every foreigner, but let your brethren go.*
Oh! was there ever such a knight in friendship or in war,
As our sovereign lord, King Henry, the soldier of Navarre!

Right well fought all the Frenchmen who fought for France that

day;

And many a lordly banner God gave them for a prey.
But we of the Religion have borne us best in fight,
And our good lord of Rosny hath ta'en the cornet white.
Our own true Maximilian the cornet white hath ta'en —
The cornet white with crosses black, the flag of false Lorraine.
Up with it high; unfurl it wide, that all the world may know
How God hath humbled the proud house that wrought his Church

such woe.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY

Then on the ground, while trumpets peal their loudest point of war,
Fling the red shreds, a foot-cloth meet for Henry of Navarre.

Ho, maidens of Vienna! ho, matrons of Luzerne!

Weep, weep, and rend your hair for those who never shall return.

Ho! Philip, send for charity thy Mexican pistoles,

That Antwerp monks may sing a mass for thy poor spearmen's souls.

Ho! gallant nobles of the League, look that your arms be bright;

Ho! burghers of St. Genevieve, keep watch and ward to-night:

For our God hath crushed the tyrant, our God hath raised the slave.

And mocked the counsel of the wise and valor of the brave.

Then glory to his holy name, from whom all glories are;

And glory to our sovereign lord, King Henry of Navarre!

944°

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

( 1830-1912)

JLTHOUGH Justin McCarthy was not without reputation as a Home
Rule politician, he was primarily a literary man ; his adventures
into the fields of history and fiction having preceded his
Parliamentary career. He was perhaps a novel writer rather than a
historian in the strict sense of the term. His histories are clever
and astute accounts of comparatively recent events, but bear little
evidence of the patient scholarship, the critical research, which are
characteristic of modern historical scholarship. Yet the ( History of

Our Own- Times,) (The Story of Glad-
stone's Life,) (The Reign of Queen Anne,)
the <Four Georges,* and the < Epoch of
Reform, > are not without the value and
interest attached to the writings of a man
of affairs whose dramatic- sense is well de-
veloped. Mr. McCarthy wrote of the first
Reform Bill, of Lord Grey, of Lord Palm-
erston, of Disraeli, of Gladstone, of Home
Rule politics, in the spirit of one who had
been in the swing of the movements which
he described, and who had known his heroes
in person or by near repute. Mr. McCar-
thy's talents as a novelist were of use to him
as a historian. He was quick to grasp the
salient features of character, and he was sensitive to the dramatic
elements in individuality. His <Leo XIII., > and his ( Modern Lead-
ers, y a series of biographical sketches, are successful portraits of
their kind. That Mr. McCarthy did not always see below the sur-
face in his estimates of famous contemporaries detracts little from the
picturesque character of his biographies. He is capable of giving to
his reader in a sentence or two a vivid if general impression of a
personality or of a literary work ; as when he says that « Charlotte
Bronte was all genius and ignorance, and George Eliot is all genius
and culture }) ; or when he says of Carlyle's ( French Revolution > that
it is <( history read by lightning. »

Justin McCarthy was a clever journalist as well as a writer of fic-
tion and history. Born at Cork in 1830, he connected himself with
the Liverpool press in 1853, and in 1860 became a member of the

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

JUSTIN MCCARTHY 9441

staff of the Morning Star. In 1864 he became chief editor. His
newspaper experience had more than a little influence upon his style
and methods of literary composition, as his political knowledge aided
him in his treatment of historical subjects. For twenty years he
was a Home Rule M.P., being first elected in 1879. After that year,
many of his novels were produced. They show the quick observa-
tion of the man' of newspaper training, and his talents as a ready
and clever writer. Mr. McCarthy's novels, like his histories and
biographies, are concerned mainly with the England of his own day.
Occasionally the plot is worked out against the background of Par-
liamentary life, as in (The Ladies' Gallery > and <The Right Honor-
able^ Among his other novels — for he wrote a great number —
are (Miss Misanthrope,* (A Fair Saxon,* <Lady Judith,' 'Dear Lady
Disdain, } <The Maid of Athens, J and <Paul Massie.* Mr. McCarthy's
style is crisp, straightforward, and for the most part entertaining. His
last years were given to a series of autobiographical works — (Re-
miniscences) (1899), (The Story of An Irishman) (1904), (Irish Recollec-
tions) (1911) — containing valuable information about contemporary
political history.

THE KING IS DEAD — LONG LIVE THE QUEEN
From (A History of Our Own Times *

BEFORE half-past two o'clock on the morning of June 2oth,
1837, William IV. was lying dead in Windsor Castle, while
the messengers were already hurrying off to Kensington
Palace to bear to his successor her summons to the throne. The
illness of the King had been but short, and at one time, even
after it had been pronounced alarming, it seemed to take so
hopeful a turn that the physicians began to think it would pass
harmlessly away. But the King was an old man — was an old
man even when he came to the throne; and when the dangerous
symptoms again exhibited themselves, their warning- was very
soon followed by fulfillment. The death of King William may
be fairly regarded as having closed an era of our history. With
him, we may believe, ended the reign of personal government
in England. William was indeed a constitutional king in more
than mere name. He was to the best of his lights a faithful
representative of the constitutional principle. He was as far in
advance of his two predecessors in understanding and acceptance
of the principle as his successor has proved herself beyond him.
Constitutional government has developed itself gradually, as

9442 JUSTIN MCCARTHY

everything else has done in English politics. The written prin-
ciple and code of its system it would be as vain to look for as
for the British Constitution itself. King William still held to
and exercised the right to dismiss his ministers ^hen he pleased,
and because he pleased. His father had held to the right of
maintaining favorite ministers in defiance of repeated votes of
the House of Commons. It would not be easy to find any
written rule or declaration of constitutional law pronouncing deci-
sively that either was in the wrong. But in our day we should
believe that the constitutional freedom of England was outraged,
or at least put in the extremest danger, if a sovereign were to
dismiss a ministry at mere pleasure, or to retain it in despite of
the expressed wish of the House of Commons. Virtually there-
fore there was still personal government in the reign of William
IV. With his death the long chapter of its history came to an
end. We find it difficult now to believe that it was a living
principle, openly at work among us, if not openly acknowledged,
so lately as in the reign of King William.

The closing scenes of King William's life were undoubtedly
characterized by some personal dignity. As a rule, sovereigns
show that they know how to die. Perhaps the necessary conse-
quence of their training, by virtue of which they come to regard
themselves always as the central figures in great State pageantry,
is to make them assume a manner of dignity on all occasions
when the eyes of their subjects may be supposed to be on
them, even if dignity of bearing is not the free gift of nature.
The manners of William IV. had. been, like those of most of his
brothers, somewhat rough and overbearing. He had been an
unmanageable naval officer. He had again and again disregarded
or disobeyed orders; and at last it had been found convenient to
withdraw him from active service altogether, and allow him to
rise through the successive ranks of his profession by a merely
formal and technical process of ascent. In his more private
capacity he had, when younger, indulged more than once in un-
seemly and insufferable freaks of temper. He had made himself
unpopular, while Duke of Clarence, by his strenuous opposition
to some of the measures which were especially desired by all the
enlightenment of the country. He was, for example, a deter-
mined opponent of the measures for the abolition of the slave
trade. He had wrangled publicly in open debate with some ot
his brothers in the House of Lords; and words had been inter-

JUSTIN MCCARTHY 9443

changed among the royal princes which could not be heard in
our day even in the hottest debates of the more turbulent House
of Commons. But William seems to have been one of the men
whom increased responsibility improves. He was far better as a
king than as a prince. He proved that he was able at least to
understand that first duty of a constitutional sovereign, which to
the last day of his active life his father, George III., never could
be brought to comprehend, — that the personal predilections and
prejudices of the king must sometimes give way to the public
interest.

Nothing perhaps in life became him like the leaving of it.
His closing days were marked by gentleness and kindly consid*
eration for the feelings of those around him. When, he awoke
on June i8th he remembered that it was the anniversary of the
Battle of Waterloo. He expressed a strong, pathetic wish to live
over that day, even if he were never to see another sunset. He
called for the flag which the Duke of Wellington always sent him
on that anniversary; and he laid his hand upon the eagle which
adorned it, and said he felt revived by the touch. He had him-
self attended since his accession the Waterloo banquet; but this
time the Duke of Wellington thought it would perhaps be more
seemly to have the dinner put off, and sent accordingly to take
the wishes of his Majesty. The King declared that the dinner
must go on as usual; and sent to the Duke a friendly, simple
message, expressing his hope that the guests might have a pleas-
ant day. He talked in his homely way to those about him, his
direct language seeming to acquire a sort of tragic dignity from
the approach of the death that was so near. He had prayers
read to him again and again, and called those near him to wit-
ness that he had always been a faithful believer in the truths of
religion. He had his dispatch-boxes brought to him, and tried
to get through some business with his private secretary. It was
remarked with some interest that the last official act he ever
performed was to sign with his trembling hand the pardon of a
condemned criminal. Even a far nobler reign than his would
have received new dignity if it closed with a deed of mercy.
When some of those around him endeavored to encourage him
with the idea that he might recover and live many years yet, he
declared with a simplicity which had something oddly pathetic in
it that he would be willing to live ten years yet for the sake of
the country. The poor King was evidently under the sincere

9444 JUSTIN MCCARTHY

conviction that England could hardly get on without him. His
consideration for his country, whatever whimsical thoughts it
may suggest, is entitled to some at least of the respect which
we give to the dying groan of a Pitt or a Mirabeau, who fears
with too much reason that he leaves a blank not easily to be
filled. (< Young royal tarry-breeks, w William had been jocularly
called by Robert Burns fifty years before, when there was yet a
popular belief that he would come all right and do brilliant and
gallant things, and become a stout sailor in whom a seafaring
nation might feel pride. He disappointed all such expectations;
but it must be owned that when responsibility came upon hirr*
he disappointed expectation anew in a different way, and 'was a
better sovereign, more deserving of the complimentary title of
patriot-king, than even his friends would have ventured to antici-
pate.

There were eulogies pronounced upon him after his death,
in both Houses of Parliament, as a matter of course. It is not
necessary, however, to set down to mere court homage or parlia-
mentary form some of the praises that were bestowed upon the
dead King by Lord Melbourne and Lord Brougham and Lord
Grey. A certain tone of sincerity, not quite free perhaps from
surprise, appears to run through some of these expressions of
admiration. They seem to say that the speakers were at one
time or another considerably surprised to find that after all, Will-
iam really was able and willing- on grave occasions to subordi-
nate his personal likings and dislikings to considerations of State
policy, and to what was shown to him to be for the good of the
nation. In this sense at least he may be called a patriot-king.
We have advanced a good deal since that time, and we require
somewhat higher and more positive qualities in a sovereign now
to excite our political wonder. But we must judge William by
the reigns that went before, and not the reign that came after
him; and with that consideration borne in mind, we may accept
the panegyric of Lord Melbourne and of Lord Grey, and admit
that on the whole he was better than his education, his early
opportunities, and his early promise.

William IV. (third son of George III.) had left no children
who could have succeeded to the throne; and the crown passed
therefore to the daughter of his brother (fourth son of George),
the Duke of Kent. This was the Princess Alexandrina Victoria,
who was born at Kensington Palace on May 24th, 1819. The

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

princess was therefore at this time little more than eighteen years
of age. The Duke of Kent died a few months after the birth of
his daughter, and the child was brought up under the care of
his widow. She was well brought up: both as regards her intel-
lect and her character her training was excellent. She was taught
to be self-reliant, brave, and systematical. Prudence and economy
were inculcated on her as though she had been born to be poor.
One is not generally inclined to attach much importance to what
historians tell us of the education of contemporary princes or
princesses; but it cannot be doubted that the Princess Victoria
was trained for intelligence and goodness.

<( The death of the King of England has everywhere caused the
greatest sensation. ... Cousin Victoria is said to have shown
'astonishing self-possession. She undertakes a heavy responsi-
bility, especially at the present moment, when parties are so
excited, and all rest their hopes on her." These words are an
extract from a letter written on July 4th, 1837, by the late Prince
Albert, the Prince Consort of so many happy years. The letter
was written to the Prince's father, from Bonn. The young Queen
had indeed behaved with remarkable self-possession. There is a
pretty description, which has been often quoted, but will bear
citing once more, given by Miss Wynn, of the manner in which
the young sovereign received the news of her accession to a
throne. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Howley, and the
Lord Chamberlain, the Marquis of Conyngham, left Windsor for
Kensington Palace, where the Princess Victoria had been resid-
ing, to inform her of the King's death. It was two hours after
midnight when they started, and they did not reach Kensington
until five o'clock in the morning. (<They knocked, they rang>
they thumped for a considerable time before they could rouse the
porter at the gate; they were again kept waiting in the court-
yard, then turned into one of the lower rooms, where they seemed
forgotten by everybody. They rang the bell, and desired that
the attendant of the Princess Victoria might be sent to inform
her Royal Highness that they requested an audience on busi-
ness of importance. After another delay, and another ringing to
inquire the cause, the attendant- was summoned, who stated that
the princess was in such a sweet sleep that she could not venture
to disturb her. Then they said, < We are come on business of
State to the Queen, and even her sleep must give way to that.'
It did; and to prove that she did not keep them waiting, in a

9446 JUSTIN MCCARTHY

few minutes she came into the room in a loose white nightgown
and shawl, her nightcap thrown off, and her hair falling upon her
shoulders, her feet in slippers, tears in her eyes, but perfectly
collected and dignified." The Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne,
was presently sent for, and a meeting of the Privy Council sum-
moned for eleven o'clock; when the Lord Chancellor administered
the usual oaths to the Queen, and Her Majesty received in re-
turn the oaths of allegiance of the Cabinet ministers and other
privy councillors present. Mr. Greville, who was usually as little
disposed to record any enthusiastic admiration of royalty and
royal personages as Humboldt or Varnhagen von Ense could have
been, has described the scene in words well worthy of quotation.

<(The King died at twenty minutes after two yesterday morning,
and the young Queen met the Council at Kensington Palace at
eleven. Never was anything like the first impression she. produced,
or the chorus of praise and admiration which is raised about her
manner and behavior, and certainly not without justice. It was
very extraordinary, and something far beyond what was looked for.
Her extreme youth and inexperience, and the ignorance of the world
concerning her, naturally excited intense curiosity to see how she
would act on this trying occasion, and there was a considerable
assemblage at the palace, notwithstanding the short notice which
was given. The first thing to be done was to teach her her lesson,
which, for this purpose, Melbourne had himself to learn. . . . She
bowed to the lords, took her seat, and then read her speech in a
clear, distinct, and audible voice, and without any appearance of fear
or embarrassment. She was quite plainly dressed, arid in mourning.
After she had read her speech, and taken and signed the oath for
the security of the Church of Scotland, the privy councillors were
sworn, the two royal dukes first by themselves; and as these two
old men, her uncles, knelt before her, swearing allegiance and kissing
her hand, I saw her blush up to the eyes, as if she felt the contrast
between their civil and their natural relations, — and this was the only
sign of emotion which she evinced. Her manner to them was very
graceful and engaging; she kissed them both, and rose from her
chair and moved towards the Duke of Sussex, who was farthest from
her, and too infirm to reach her. She seemed rather bewildered
at the multitude of men who were sworn, and who came, one after
another, to kiss her hand, but she did not speak to anybody, nor did
she make the slightest difference in her manner, or show any in
her countenance, to any individual of any rank, station, or party. 1
particularly watched her when Melbourne and the ministers, and tha

JUSTIN MCCARTHY 9447

Duke of Wellington and Peel, approached her. She went through
the whole ceremony, occasionally looking at Melbourne for instruction
when she had any doubt what to do, — which hardly ever occurred, —
and with perfect calmness and self-possession, but at the same time
with a graceful modesty and propriety particularly interesting and
ingratiating."

Sir Robert Peel told Mr. Greville that he was amazed ((at her
manner and behavior, at her apparent deep sense of her situa-
tion, and at the same time her firmness." The Duke of Welling,
ton said in his blunt way that if she had been his own daughter
he could not have desired to see her perform her part better,
<(At twelve," says Mr, Greville, <( she held a Council, at which
she presided with as much ease as if she had been doing nothing
else all her life; and though Lord Lansdowne and my colleague
had contrived between them to make some confusion with the
Council papers, she was not put out by it. She looked very well ;
and though so small in stature, and without much pretension to
beauty, the gracefulness of her manner and the good expression
of her countenance give her on the whole a very agreeable ap-
pearance, and with her youth inspire an excessive interest in all
who approach her, and which I can't help feeling myself. . . .
In short, she appears to act with every sort of good taste and
good feeling, as well as good sense; and as far as it has gone,
nothing can be more favorable than the impression she has
made, and nothing can promise better than her manner and con-
duct do; though," Mr. Greville somewhat superfluously adds, ((it
would be rash to count too confidently upon her judgment and
discretion in more weighty matters."

The interest or curiosity with which the demeanor of the
young Queen was watched was all the keener because the world
in general knew so little about her. Not merely was the world
in general thus ignorant, but even the statesmen and officials in
closest communication with court circles were in almost absolute
ignorance. According to Mr. Greville (whose authority, however,
is not to be taken too implicitly except as to matters which he
actually saw), the young Queen had been previously kept in such
seclusion by her mother — "never," he says, ft having slept out
of her bedroom, nor been alone with anybody but herself and
the Baroness Lehzen" — that (<not one of her acquaintances, none
of the attendants at Kensington, not even the Duchess of North-
umberland, her governess, have any idea what she is or what

9443 JUSTIN MCCARTHY

she promises to be." There was enough in the court of the two
sovereigns who went before Queen Victoria to justify any strict-
ness of seclusion which the Duchess of Kent might desire for
her daughter. George IV. was a Charles II. without the edu-
cation or the talents; William IV. was a Frederick William of
Prussia without the genius. The ordinary manners of the society
at the court of either had a full flavor, to put it in the softest
way, such as a decent tap-room would hardly exhibit in a time
like the present. No one can read even the most favorable
descriptions given by contemporaries of the manners of those
two courts, without feeling grateful to the Duchess of Kent for
resolving that her daughter should see as little as possible of
their ways and their company.

It was remarked with some interest that the Queen sub-
scribed herself simply "Victoria," and not, as had been expected,
C( Alexandrina Victoria. }) Mr. Greville mentions in ' his diary of
December 24th, 1819, that <(the Duke of Kent gave the name
of Alexandrina to his daughter in compliment to the Emperor of
Russia. She was to have had the name of Georgiana, but the
duke insisted upon Alexandrina being her first name. The Regent
sent for Lieven [the Russian ambassador, husband of the famous
Princess de Lieven], and made him a great many compliments,
en le persiflant, on the Emperor's being godfather; but informed
him that the name of Georgiana could be second to no other in
this country, and therefore she could not bear it at all.® It was
a very wise choice to employ simply the name Victoria, around
which no tmgenial associations of any kind hung at that time,
and which can have only grateful associations in the history of
this country for the future.

It 'is not necessary to go into any formal description of the
various ceremonials and pageantries which celebrated the acces-
sion of the new sovereign. The proclamation - of the Queen,
her appearance for the first time on the throne in the House of
Lords when she prorogued Parliament in person, and even the
gorgeous festival of her coronation, — which took place on June
28th, in the following year, 1838, — may be passed over with a
mere word of record. It is worth mentioning, however, that at
the coronation procession one of the most conspicuous figures
was that of Marshal Soult, Duke of Dalmatia, the opponent of
Moore and Wellington in the Peninsula, the commander of the
Old Guard at Llitzen, and one of the strong arms of Napoleon at

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

Waterloo. Soult had been sent as ambassador extraordinary to
represent the French government and people at the coronation
of Queen Victoria; and nothing could exceed the enthusiasm with
which he was received by the crowds in the streets of London
on that day. The white-haired soldier was cheered wherever a
glimpse of his face or figure could be caught. He appeared in
the procession in a carriage the frame of which had been used
on occasions of state by some of the princes of the House of
Conde, and which Soult had had splendidly decorated for the
ceremony of the coronation. Even the Austrian ambassador,
says an eye-witness, attracted less attention than Soult, although
the dress of the Austrian, Prince Esterhazy, <(down to his very
boot-heels sparkled with diamonds. }) The comparison savors now
of the ridiculous, but is remarkably expressive and effective.
Prince Esterhazy's name in those days suggested nothing but
diamonds. His diamonds may be said to glitter through all the
light literature of the time.. When Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
wanted a comparison with which to illustrate excessive splendor
and brightness, she found it in (< Mr. Pitt's diamonds. }> Prince
Esterhazy's served the same purpose for the writers of the early
years of the present reign. It was therefore, perhaps, no very
poor tribute to the stout old moustache of the Republic and the
Empire to say that at a London pageant his war-worn face drew
attention away from Prince Esterhazy's diamonds. Soult himself
felt very warmly the genuine kindness of the reception given to
him. Years after, in a debate in the French Chamber, when M.
Guizot was accused of too much partiality for the English alliance,
Marshal Soult declared himself a warm champion of that alliance.
<(I fought the English down to Toulouse, }> he said, "when I
fired the last cannon in defense of the national independence:
in the mean time I have been in London; and France knows
the reception which I had there. The English themselves cried
*Vive Soult !> — they cried, < Soult forever !> I had learned to
estimate the English on the field of battle; I have learned to esti-
mate them in peace: and I repeat that I am a warm partisan of
the English alliance. » History is not exclusively made by cab-
inets and professional diplomatists. It is highly probable that
the cheers of a London crowd on the day of the Queen's corona-
tion did something genuine and substantial to restore the good
feeling between this country and France, and efface the bitter
memories of Waterloo,

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

It is a fact well worthy of note, amid whatever records of
court ceremonial and of political change, that a few days after
the accession of the Queen, Mr. Montefiore was elected Sheriff
of London (the first Jew who had ever been chosen for that
office), and that he received knighthood at the hands of her
Majesty when she visited the City on the following Lord Mayor's
day. He was the first Jew whom royalty had honored in this
country since the good old times when royalty was pleased to
borrow the Jew's money, or order instead the extraction of his
teeth. The expansion of the principle of religious liberty and
equality, which has been one of the most remarkable characteris-
tics of the reign of Queen Victoria, could hardly have been more
becomingly inaugurated than by the compliment which sovereign
and city paid to Sir Moses Montefiore.

A MODERN ENGLISH STATESMAN
From <A History of Our Own Times >

«T TN-ARM, Eros: the long day's task is done, and we must
|^J sleep!" A long, very long day's task was nearly done.
A marvelous career was fast drawing to its close. Down
in Hertfordshire Lord Palmerston was dying. As Mirabeau said
of himself, so Palmerston might have said: he could already hear
the preparations for the funeral of Achilles. He had enjoyed life
to the last as fully as ever Churchill did, although in a different
sense. Long as his life was, if counted by mere years, it seems
much longer still when we consider what it had compassed, and
how active it had been from the earliest to the very end. Many
men were older than Lord Palmerston; he left more than one
senior behind him. But they were for the most part men whose
work had long been done, — men who had been consigned to the
arm-chair of complete inactivity. Palmerston was a hard-working
statesman until within a very few days of his death. He had
been a member of Parliament for nearly sixty years. He entered
Parliament for the first time in the year when Byron, like him-
self a Harrow boy, published his first poems. .He had been in
the House of Commons for thirty years when the Queen came to
the throne. He used to play chess with the unfortunate Caroline
of Brunswick, wife of the Prince Regent, when she lived at

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

Kensington as Princess of Wales. In 1808, being then one of
the Lords of the Admiralty, he had defended the Copenhagen
expedition of the year before, and insisted that it was a stroke
indispensable to the defeat of the designs of Napoleon. During
all his political career he was only out of office for rare and brief
seasons. To be a private member of Parliament was a short
occasional episode in his successful life. In the words of Sadi,
the Persian poet, he had obtained an ear of corn from every
harvest.

No man since the death of the Duke of Wellington had filled
so conspicuous a place in the public mind. No man had enjoyed
anything like the same amount of popularity. He died at the
moment when that popularity had reached its very zenith. It
hajd become the fashion of the day to praise all he said and all
he did. It was the settled canon of the ordinary Englishman's
faith, that what Palmerston said England must feel. . .

Privately, he can hardly have had any enemies. He had a
kindly heart, which won on all people who came near him. He
had no enduring enmities or capricious dislikes; and it was there-
fore very hard for ill-feeling to live in his beaming, friendly
presence. He never disliked men merely because he had often to
encounter them in political war. He tried his best to give them
as good as they brought, and he bore no malice. There were
some men whom he disliked, as we have already mentioned in
these volumes; but they were men who for one reason or another
stood persistently in his way, and who, he fancied he had reason
to believe, had acted treacherously towards him. He liked a man
to be "English," and he liked him to be what he considered a
gentleman; but he did not restrict his definition of the word
<( gentleman }) to the mere qualifications of birth or social rank.
His manners were frank and genial rather than polished; and his
is one of the rare instances in which a man contrived always
to keep up his personal dignity without any stateliness of bearing
and tone. He was a model combatant: when the combat was
over, he was ready to sit down by his antagonist's side and be
his friend, and talk over their experiences and exploits. He was
absolutely free from affectation. This very fact gave sometimes
an air almost of roughness to his manners, he could be so plain-
spoken and downright when suddenly called on to express his
mind. He was not, in the highest sense of the word, a truthful
man; that is to say, ijiere were episodes of his career in which

9452 JUSTIN MCCARTHY

for purposes of statecraft he allowed the House of Commons and
the country to become the dupes of an erroneous impression.
Personally truthful and honorable of course it would be super-
fluous to pronounce him. A man of Palmerston's bringing-up is
as certain to be personally truthful as he is to be brave, and to
be fond of open-air exercise and the cold bath. But Palmerston
was too often willing- to distinguish between the personal and the
political integrity of a statesman. The distinction is common to
the majority of statesmen: so much the worse for statesmanship.
But the gravest errors of this kind which Palmerston had com-
mitted were committed for an earlier generation. . . .

His greatest praise with Englishmen must be that he loved
England with a sincere love that never abated. He had no pre-
dilection, no prejudice, that did not give way where the welfare
of England was concerned. He ought to have gone one step
higher in the path of public duty: he ought to have loved justice
and right even more than he loved England. He ought to have
felt more tranquilly convinced that the cause of justice and of
right must be the best thing which an English minister could
advance even for England's sake in the end. Lord Palmerston
was not a statesman who took any lofty view of a minister's
duties. His statesmanship never stood on any high moral eleva-
tion. He sometimes did things in the cause of England which
we may well believe he would not have done for any considera-
tion in any cause of his own. His policy was necessarily shift-
ing, uncertain, and inconsistent; for he molded it always on the
supposed interests of England as they showed themselves to his
eyes at the time. His sympathies with liberty were capricious
guides. Sympathies with liberty must be so always where there
is no clear principle defining objects and guiding conduct. Lord
Palmerston was not prevented by his liberal sympathies from
sustaining the policy of the Coup d'Etat; nor did his hatred of
slavery, one of his few strong and genuine emotions apart from
English interests, inspire him with any repugnance for the cause
of the Southern slaveholders. But it cannot be. doubted that his
very defects were a main cause of his popularity and his success.
He was able always with a good conscience to assure the English
people that they were the greatest and the best — the only good
and great — people in the world, because he had long taught him-
self to believe this, and had come to believe it. He was always
popular, because his speeches invariably conveyed this impression

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

to the English crowd whom he addressed in or out of Parliament.
Other public men spoke for the most part to tell English peo-
ple of something they ought to do which they were not doing,
something which they had done and ought not to have done. It
is not in the nature of things that such men should be as popular
as those who told England that whatever she did must be right.
Nor did Palmerston lay on his praise with coarse and palpable
artifice. He had no artifice in the matter. He believed what he
said; and his very sincerity made it the more captivating and the
more dangerous.

A phrase sprang up in Palmerston's days which was employed
to stigmatize certain political conduct beyond all ordinary re-
proach. It was meant to stamp such conduct as outside the
pale of reasonable argument or patriotic consideration. That was
the word "un-English." It was enough with certain classes to
say that anything was (< un-English w in order to put it utterly
out of court. No matter to what principles, higher, more uni-
versal, and more abiding than those that are merely English, it
might happen to appeal, the one word of condemnation was held
to be enough for it. Some of the noblest and the wisest men
of our day were denounced as "un-English." A stranger might
have asked in wonder, at one time, whether it was un-English
to be just, to be merciful, to have consideration for the claims
and the rights of others, to admit that there was any higher
object in a nation's life than a diplomatic success. All that
would have made a man odious and insufferable in private life
was apparently held up as belonging to the virtues of the Eng-
lish nation. Rude self-assertion, blunt disregard for the feelings
and the claims of others, a self-sufficiency which would regard
all earth's interests as made for England's special use alone, — •
the yet more outrageous form of egotism which would fancy that
the moral code as it applies to others does not apply to us, — all
this seemed to be considered the becoming national character-
istic of the English people. It would be almost superfluous to
say that this did not show its worst in Lord Palmerston himself.
As in art, so in politics, we never see how bad some peculiar
defect is until we see it in the imitators of a great man's style.
A school of Palmerstons, had it been powerful and lasting, would
have made England a nuisance to other nations. . . . We
have no hesitation in saying that Lord Palmerston's statesman-
ship on the whole lowered the moral tone of English politics for

JUSTIN MCCARTHY

a time. This consideration alone, if there were nothing else, for-
bids us to regard him as a statesman whose deeds were equal to
his opportunities and to his genius. To serve the purpose of the
hour was his policy. To succeed in serving it was his triumph.
It is not thus that a great fame is built up, unless indeed where
the genius of the man is like that of some Caesar or Napoleon,
which can convert its very ruins into monumental records. Lord
Palmerston is hardly to be called a great man. Perhaps he may
be called a great "man of the time.*

9455

GEORGE MACDONALD

(1824-1905)

EORGE MACDONALD has been characterized as a Across between
a poet and a spiritual teacher. }) His powers as a novelist,
however, are not taken into account by this description.
Added to his genuine poetical feeling, and to his refined moral sense,
are the qualities of a good story-teller. He knows how to handle an
elaborate plot; he understands the dramatic values of situations; he
can put life into his characters. Yet the dominant impression left
by his novels is their essential moral nobility. The ideal which Mr.
Macdonald sets before himself as a writer
of fiction is summed up in this passage
from <Sir Gibbie*: —

<*But whatever the demand of the age, I
insist that that which ought to be presented to
its beholding is the common good, uncommonly
developed: and that not because of its rarity, but
because it is truer to humanity. It is the noble,
not the failure from the noble, that is the true
human: and if I must show the failure, let it
ever be with an eye to the final possible, yea,
imperative success. But in our day a man who
will accept any oddity of idiosyncratic develop-
ment in manners, tastes, and habits, will refuse
not only as improbable, but as inconsistent with

human nature, the representation of a man trying to be merely as noble as is
absolutely essential to his being. »

This quaint realism of Mr. Macdonald's in a literary age, when
many believe that only the evil in man's nature is real, dominates
his novels, from < David Elginbrod > to <The Elect Lady.' They are
wholesome stories of pure men and women. The author is at his
strongest when drawing a character like that of Sir Gibbie, com-
pelled forever to follow the highest law of his nature. With villains
and with mean folk, Mr. Macdonald can do nothing. He cannot un-
derstand them, neither can he understand complexity of character.
He is too dogmatic ever to see the « shadowy third » between the
and one. He is too much of a preacher to be altogether a
lovelist.

GEORGE MACDONALD

9456 GEORGE MACDONALD

His training increased his dogmatic faculty. Born at Huntly,
Aberdeenshire, in 1824, he was graduated at King's College, Aber-
deen, and then entered upon the study of theology at the Independ-
ent College, Highbury, London. He was for a time a preacher in
the Scottish Congregational Church, but afterwards became a layman
in the Church of England. He then assumed the principalship of a
seminary in London. His novels witness to his Scotch origin and
training. The scenes of many of them are laid in Scotland, and not
a few of the characters speak the North-Scottish dialect. But the
spirit which informs them is even more Scotch than their setting.
The strong moral convictions of George Macdonald infuse them with
the sermonizing element. The novelist is of the spiritual kindred of
the Covenanters. Yet they are full of a kindly humanity, and where
the moralist is merged in the writer of fiction they attain a high
degree of charm.

His pure and tender spirit made him peculiarly fitted to under-
stand children and child life. ((Gibbie had never been kissed,)) he
writes; ((and how is any child £o thrive without kisses?)) His stories
for children, (At the Back of the North Wind) and (The Princess
and Curdie,) are full of beauty in their 'fine sympathy for the moods
of a child.

George Macdonald wrote a great number of novels. They in-
clude (David Elginbrod,) (Alec Forbes of How Glen,) (Annals of a
Quiet Neighborhood,) (The Seaboard Parish) (sequel to the foregoing),
(Robert Falconer,) ( Wilfrid Cumbermede,) (Malcolm,) (The Marquis
of Lossie,) (St. George and St. Michael,) (Sir Gibbie,) (What's Mine's
Mine,) (The Elect Lady,) and such fanciful stories as his well-known
(Phantastes.) He also published (Miracles of Our Lord) and (Un-
spoken Sermons.) His sermons, as might be expected, are vigorous,
and exhibit his peculiar sensitiveness to the moral and spiritual elements
in man's existence. This same sensitiveness pervades his verse.
George Macdonald's death occurred in London on September i8th,
1905.

THE FLOOD

From <Sir Gibbie >

STILL the rain fell and the wind blew; the torrents came tear-
ing- down from the hills, and shot madly into the rivers; the
rivers ran into the valleys, and deepened the lakes that filled
them. On every side of the Mains, from the foot of Glashgar to
Gormdrm, all was one yellow and red sea, with roaring currents

GEORGE MACDONALD

9457

and vortices numberless. It burrowed holes, it opened long-
deserted channels and water-courses; here it deposited inches of
rich mold, there yards of sand and gravel; here it was carrying
away fertile ground, leaving behind only bare rock or shingle
where the corn had been waving; there it was scooping out the
bed of a new lake. Many a thick soft lawn of loveliest grass,
dotted with fragrant shrubs and rare trees, vanished, and nothing
was there when the waters subsided but a stony waste, or a grav-
elly precipice. Woods and copses were undermined, and trees and
soil together swept into the vast; sometimes the very place was
hardly there to say it knew its children no more. Houses were
torn to pieces; and their contents, as from broken boxes, sent
wandering on the brown waste through the gray air to the dis-
colored sea, whose saltness for a long way out had vanished with
its hue. Hay-mows were buried to the very top in sand; others
went sailing bodily down the mighty stream — some of them fol-
lowed or surrounded, like big ducks, by a great brood off ricks for
their ducklings. Huge trees went past as if shot down an Alpine
slide — cottages and bridges of stone giving way before them.
Wooden mills, thatched roofs, great mill-wheels, went dipping
and swaying and hobbling down. From the upper windows of
the Mains, looking towards the chief current, they saw a drift of
everything belonging to farms and dwelling-houses that would
float. Chairs and tables, chests, carts, saddles, chests of drawers,
tubs of linen, beds and blankets, work-benches, harrows, girnels,
planes, cheeses, churns, spinning-wheels, cradles, iron pots, wheel-
barrows— all these and many other things hurried past as they
gazed. Everybody was looking, and for a time all had been
silent. . . .

Just as Mr. Duff entered the stable from the nearer end, the
opposite gable fell out with a great splash, letting in the wide
level vision of turbidly raging waters, fading into the obscurity
of the wind-driven rain. While he stared aghast, a great tree
struck the wall like a battering-ram, so that the stable shook.
The horses, which had been for some time moving uneasily, were
now quite scared. There was not a moment to be lost. Duff
shouted for his men; one or two came running; and in less
than a minute more, those in the house heard the iron-shod feet
splashing and stamping through the water, as one after another
the horses were brought across the yard to the door of the house.
Mr. Duff led by the halter his favorite Snowball, who was a good

9458

GEORGE MACDONALD

deal excited, plunging and rearing so that it was all he could do
to hold him. He had ordered the men to take the others first,
thinking he would follow more quietly. But the moment Snow-
ball heard the first thundering of hoofs on the stair, he went out
of his senses with terror, broke from his master, and went plun-
ging back to the stable. Duff started after him, but was only in
time to see him rush from the further end into the swift cur-
rent, where he was at once out of his depth, and was instantly
caught and hurried, rolling over and over, from his master's
sight. He ran back into the house, and up to the highest win-
dow. From that he caught sight of him a long way down,
swimming. Once or twice he saw him turned heels over head —
only to get his neck up again presently, and swim as well as
before. But alas! it was in the direction of the Daur, which
would soon, his master did not doubt, sweep his carcass into the
North Sea. With troubled heart he strained his sight after him
as long as he could distinguish his lessening head, but it got
amongst some wreck; and, unable to tell any more whether he
saw it or not, he returned to his men with his eyes full of tears.

Gibbie woke with the first of the dawn. The rain still fell —
descending in spoonfuls rather than drops; the wind kept shaping
itself into long hopeless howls, rising to shrill yells that went
drifting away over the land; and then the howling rose again.
Nature seemed in despair. There must be more for Gibbie to
do! He must go again to the foot of the mountain, and see if
there was anybody to help. They might even be in trouble at
the Mains: who could tell! . . .

Gibbie sped down the hill through a worse rain than ever.
The morning was close, and the vapors that filled it were like
smoke burned to the hue of the flames whence it issued. Many
a man that morning believed another great deluge begun, and all
measures relating to things of this world lost labor. Going down
his own side of the Glashburn, the nearest path to the valley,
the gamekeeper's cottage was the first dwelling on his way. It
stood a little distance from the bank of the burn, opposite the
bridge and gate, while such things were.

It had been with great difficulty — for even Angus did not
know the mountain so well as Gibbie . — that the gamekeeper
reached it with the housekeeper the night before. It was within
two gun-shots of the house of Glashruach, yet to get to it they

GEORGE MACDONALD

had to walk miles up and down Glashgar. A mountain in storm
is as hard to cross as a sea. Arrived, they did not therefore
feel safe. The tendency of the Glashburn was indeed away from
the cottage, as the grounds of Glashruach sadly witnessed; but
a torrent is double-edged, and who could tell? The yielding of
one stone in its channel might send it to them. All night Angus
watched, peering out ever again into the' darkness, but seeing
nothing save three lights that burned above the water — one of
them, he thought, at the Mains. The other two went out in the
darkness, but that only in the dawn. When the morning came,
there was the Glashburn meeting the Lorrie in his garden. But
the cottage was well built, and fit to stand a good siege, while
any moment the waters might have reached their height. By
breakfast-time, however, they were round it from behind. There
is nothing like a flood for revealing the variations of surface, the
dips and swells of a country. In a few minutes they were iso-
lated, with the current of the Glashburn on one side and that
of the Lorrie in front. When he saw the water come in at front
and back doors at once, Angus ordered his family up the stair:
the cottage had a large attic, with dormer windows, where they
slept. He himself remained below for some time longer, in that
end of the house where he kept his guns and fishing-tackle ; there
he sat on a table, preparing nets for the fish that would be left
in the pools; and not until he found himself afloat did he take
his work to the attic.

There the room was hot, and they had the window open.
Mistress MacPholp stood at it, looking out on the awful prospect,
with her youngest child, a sickly boy, in her arms. He had in
his a little terrier pup, greatly valued of the gamekeeper. In a
sudden outbreak of peevish willfulness, he threw the creature out
of the window. It fell on the sloping roof, and before it could
recover itself, being too young to have the full command of four
legs, rolled off.

<(Eh! the doggie's i' the watter!" cried Mistress MacPholp in
dismay.

Angus threw down everything with an ugly oath, — for he had
given strict orders not one of the children should handle the
whelp, — jumped up, and got out on the roof. From there he
might have managed to reach it. so high now was the water, had
the little thing remained where it fell; but already it had swum
a yard or two from the house. Angus, who was a fair swimmer

9460

GEORGE MACDONALD

and an angry man, threw off his coat, and plunging- after it,
greatly to the delight of the little one, caught the pup. with his
teeth by the back of .the neck, and turned to make for the house.
Just then a shrub swept from the hill caught him in the face,
and so bewildered him that before he got rid of it he had blun-
dered into the edge of the current, which seized and bore him
rapidly away. He dropped the pup and struck out for home
with all his strength. But he soon found the most he could do
was to keep his head above water, and gave himself up for lost.
His wife screamed in agony. Gibbie heard her as he came down
the hill, and ran at full speed towards the cottage.

About a hundred yards from the house, the current bore
Angus straight into a large elder-tree. He got into the middle
of it, and there remained trembling, — the weak branches break-
ing with every motion he made, while the stream worked at the
roots, and the wind laid hold of him with fierce leverage. In
terror, seeming still to sink as he sat, he watched the trees dart
by like battering-rams in the swiftest of the current ; the least of
them diverging would tear the elder-tree with it. Brave enough
in dealing with poachers, Angus was not the man to gaze with
composure in the face of a sure slow death, against which no
assault could be made. Many a man is courageous because he
has not conscience enough to make a coward of him, but Angus
had not quite reached that condition; and from the branches of
the elder-tree showed a pale, terror-stricken visage. Amidst the
many objects in the face of the water, Gibbie, however, did not
distinguish it; and plunging in, swam round to the front of the
cottage to learn what was the matter. There the wife's gesticu-
lations directed his eyes to her drowning husband.

But what was he to do? He could swim to the tree well
enough, and, he thought, back again; but how was that to be
made of service to Angus ? He could not save him by main
force: there was not enough of that between them. If he had
a line — and there must be plenty of lines in the cottage — he
could carry him the end of it to haul upon: that would do. If
he could send it to him, that would be better still; for then he
could help at the other end, and would be in the right position
up-stream to help further if necessary, for down the current
alone was the path of communication open. He caught hold of
the eaves and scrambled on to the roof. But in the folly and
faithlessness of her despair, the woman would not let him enter.

GEORGE MACDONALD 946 x

With a curse caught from her husband, she struck him from the
window, crying —

(<Ye s' no come in here, an' my man droonin' yon'er! Gang
till 'im, ye cooard!}>

Never had poor Gibbie so much missed the use of speech.
On the slope of the roof he could do little to force an entrance,
therefore threw himself off it to seek another, and betook him-
self to the windows below. Through that of Angus's room, he
caught sight of a floating anker cask. It was the very thing! —
and there on the walls hung a quantity of nets and cordage!
But how to get in ? It was a sash window, and of course swol-
len with the wet, and therefore not to be opened; and there was
not a square in it large enough to let him through. He swam
to the other side, and crept softly on to the roof and over the
ridge. But a broken slate betrayed him. The woman saw him,
rushed to the fireplace, caught up the poker, and darted back to
defend the window.

«Ye s' no come in here, I tell ye," she screeched, <( an' my
man stickin' i' yon boortree buss ! w

Gibbie advanced. She made a blow at him with the poker.
He caught it, wrenched it from her grasp, and threw himself
from the roof. The next moment they 'heard the poker at work
smashing the window.

"He'll be in an' murder 's a'!" cried the mother, and ran to
the stair, while the children screamed and danced with terror.

But the water was far too deep for her. She returned to the
attic, barricaded the door, and went again to the window to
watch her drowning husband.

Gibbie was inside in a moment; and seizing the cask, pro-
ceeded to attach to it a strong line. He broke a bit from a
fishing-rod, secured the line round the middle of it with a notch,
put the stick through the bunghole in the bilge, and corked up
the whole with a net-float. Happily he had a knife in his pocket.
He then joined strong lines together until he thought he had
length enough, secured the last end to a bar of the grate, and
knocked out both sashes of the ^window with an axe. A passage
thus cleared, he floated out first a chair, then a creepie, and one
thing after another, to learn from what part to start the bar-
rel. Seeing and recognizing them from above, Mistress MacPholp
raised a terrible outcry. In the very presence of her drowning
husband, such a wanton dissipation of her property roused her to

9462

GEORGE MACDONALD

fiercest wrath; for she imagined Gibbie was emptying her house
with leisurely revenge. Satisfied at length, he floated out his
barrel, and followed with the line in his hand, to aid its direction
if necessary. It struck the tree. With a yell of joy Angus laid
hold of it, and hauling the line taut, and feeling it secure, com-
mitted himself at once to the water, holding by the barrel and
swimming with his legs, while Gibbie, away to the side with a
hold of the rope, was swimming his hardest to draw him out of
the current. But a weary man was Angus when at length he
reached the house. It was all he could do to get himself in
at the window and crawl up the stair. At the top of it he fell
benumbed on the floor.

By the time that, repentant and grateful, Mistress MacPholp
bethought herself of Gibbie, not a trace of him was to be seen.
While they looked for him in the water and on the land, Gib-
bie was again in the room below, carrying out a fresh thought.
With the help of the table he emptied the cask, into which a
good deal of water had got. Then he took out the stick, corked
the bunghole tight, laced the cask up in a piece of net, attached
the line to the net and wound it about the cask by rolling the
latter round and round, took the cask between his hands, and
pushed from the window straight into the current of the Glash-
burn. In a moment it had swept him to the Lorrie. By the
greater rapidity of the former he got easily across the heavier
current of the latter, and was presently in water comparatively
still, swimming quietly towards the Mains, and enjoying his trip
none the less that he had to keep a sharp lookout: if he should
have to dive to avoid any drifting object, he might lose his
barrel. Quickly now, had he been so minded, he could have
returned to the city, — changing vessel for vessel, as one after
another went to pieces. Many a house roof offered itself for the
voyage; now and then a great water-wheel, horizontal and help-
less, devoured of its element. Once he saw a cradle come gyrat-
ing along, and urging all his might, intercepted it; but hardly
knew whether he was more sorry or relieved to find it empty.
When he was about half-way to the Mains, a whole fleet of ricks
bore down upon him. He boarded one, and scrambled to the top
of it, keeping fast hold of the end of his Hne, which unrolled
from the barrel as he ascended. From its peak he surveyed the
wild scene. All was running water. Not a human being was
visible, and but a few house roofs; of which for a moment it was

GEORGE MACDONALD

9463

hard to say whether or not they were of those that were afloat.
Here and there were the tops of trees, showing like low bushes.
Nothing was uplifted except the mountains. He drew near the
Mains. All the ricks in the yard were bobbing about, as if
amusing themselves with a slow contra-dance ; but they were as
yet kept in by the barn and a huge old hedge of hawthorn.
What was that cry from far away ? Surely it was that of a horse
in danger! It brought a lusty equine response from the farm.
Where could horses be, with such a depth of water about the
place ? Then began a great lowing of cattle. But again came
the cry of the horse from afar, and Gibbie, this time recognizing
the voice as Snowball's, forgot the rest. He stood up on the
very top of the rick, and sent his keen glance round on all sides.
The cry came again and again, so that he was soon satisfied in
what direction he must look. The rain had abated a little; but
the air was so thick with vapor that he could not tell whether it
was really an object he seemed to see white against the brown
water, far away to the left, or a fancy of his excited hope; it
might be Snowball on the turnpike road, which thereabout ran
along the top of a high embankment. He tumbled from the rick,
rolled the line about the barrel, and pushed vigorously for what
might be the horse.

It took him a weary hour- — -in so many currents was he
caught, one after the other, all straining to carry him far below
the object he wanted to reach: an object it plainly was, before
he had got half-way across; and by-and-by as plainly it was
Snowball, testified to ears and eyes together. When at length
he scrambled on the embankment beside him, the poor shivering,
perishing creature gave a low neigh of delight: he did not know
Gibbie, but he was a human being. He was quite cowed and
submissive, and Gibbie at once set about his rescue. He had
reasoned as he came along, that if there were beasts at the
Mains there must be room for Snowball, and thither he would
endeavor to take him. He tied the end of the line to the rem-
nant of the halter on his head, the other end being still fast to
the barrel, and took to the water again. Encouraged by the power
upon his head, — the pressure, namely, of the halter, — the horse
followed, and they made for the Mains. It was a long journey,
and Gibbie had not breath enough to sing to Snowball, but he
made what noises he could, and they got slowly along. He found
the difficulties far greater now that he had to look out for the

9464

• GEORGE MACDONALD

horse as well as for himself. None but one much used to the
water could have succeeded in the attempt, or could indeed have
stood out against its weakening influence and the strain of the
continued exertion together so long. At length his barrel got
waterlogged, and he sent it adrift. . . .

When they arrived at the door, they found a difficulty await-
ing them: the water was now so high that Snowball's head rose
above the lintel; and though all animals can swim, they do not
all know how to dive. A tumult of suggestions immediately broke
out. But Donal had already thrown himself from a window with
a rope, and swum to Gibbie's assistance; the two understood each
other, and heeding nothing the rest were saying, held their own
communications. In a minute the rope was fastened round Snow-
ball's body, and the end of it drawn between his forelegs and
through the ring of his head-stall, when Donal swam with it to
his mother who stood on the stair, with the request that as soon
as she saw Snowball's head under the water, she would pull with
all her might, and draw him in at the door. Donal then swam
back, and threw his arms around Snowball's neck from below,
while the same moment Gibbie cast his whole weight on it from
above: the horse was over head and ears in an instant, and
through the door in another. With snorting nostrils and blazing
eyes his head rose in the passage, and in terror he struck out
for the stair. As he scrambled heavily up from the water, his
master and Robert seized him, and with much petting and patting
and gentling, though there was little enough difficulty in man-
aging him now, conducted him into the bedroom to the rest of the
horses. There he was welcomed by his companions, and immedi-
ately began devouring the hay upon his master's bedstead. Gib-
bie came close behind him, was seized by Janet at the top of the
stair, embraced like one come alive from the grave, and led, all
dripping as he was, into the room where the women were.

THE HAY-LOFT
From <At the Back of the North Wind >

I HAVE been asked to tell you about the back of the North
Wind. An old Greek writer mentions a people who lived
there, and were so comfortable that they could not bear it
any longer, and drowned themselves. My story is not the same

GEORGE MACDONALD

as his. I do not think Herodotus had got the right account of
the place. I am going to tell you how it fared with a boy who
went there.

He lived in a low room over a coach-house; and that was not
by any means at the back of the North Wind, as his mother very
well knew. For one side of the room was built only of boards,
and the boards .were so old that you might run a penknife
through into the North Wind. And then let them settle between
them which was the sharper! I know that when you pulled it
out again, the wind would be after it like a cat after a mouse,
and you would know soon enough you were not at the back of
the North Wind. Still, this room was not very cold, except when
the north wind blew stronger than usual: the room I have to do
with now was always cold, except in summer, when the sun took
the matter into his own hands. Indeed, I am not sure whether
I ought to call it a room at all; for it was just a loft where they
kept hay and straw and oats for the horses. And when little
Diamond — but stop: I must tell you that his father, who was a
coachman, had named him after a favorite horse, and his mother
had had no objection — when little Diamond, then, lay there in bed,
he could hear the horses under him munching away in the dark,
or moving sleepily in their dreams. For Diamond's father had
built him a bed in the loft with boards all round it, because they
had so little room in their own end over the coach-house; and
Diamond's father put old Diamond in the stall under the bed,
because he was a quiet • horse, and did not go to sleep standing,
but lay down like a reasonable creature. But although he was a
surprisingly reasonable creature, yet when young Diamond woke
in the middle of the night and felt the bed shaking in the blasts
of the North Wind, he could not help wondering whether, if the
wind should blow the house down, and he were to fall through
into the manger, old Diamond mightn't eat him up before he
knew him in his night-gown. And although old Diamond was
very quiet all night long, yet when he woke he got up like an
earthquake; and then young Diamond knew what o'clock it was,
or at least what was to be done next, which was — to go to sleep
again as fast as he could.

There was hay at his feet and hay at his head, piled up in
great trusses to the very roof. Indeed, it was sometimes only
through a little lane with several turnings, which looked as if it
had been sawn out for him, that he could reach his bed at all.

GEORGE MACDONALD

For the stock of hay was of course always in a state either of
slow ebb or of sudden flow. Sometimes the whole space of the
loft, with the little panes in the roof for the stars to look in,
would lie open before his open eyes as he lay in bed; sometimes
a yellow wall of sweet-smelling fibres closed up his view at
the distance of half a yard. Sometimes when his mother had
undressed him in her room, and told him to trot away to bed by
himself, he would creep into the heart of the hay, and lie there
thinking how cold it was outside in the wind, and how warm it
was inside there in his bed, and how he could go to it when he
pleased, only he wouldn't just yet: he would get a little colder
first. And ever as he grew colder, his bed would grow warmer,
till at last he would scramble out of the hay, shoot like an arrow
into his bed, cover himself up, and snuggle down, thinking what
a happy boy he was. He had not the least idea that the wind
got in at a chink in the wall, and blew about him all night. For
the back of his bed was only of boards an inch thick, and on the
other side of them was the North Wind.

Now, as I have already said, these boards were soft and
crumbly. To be sure, they were tarred on the outside, yet in
many places they were more like tinder than timber. Hence it
happened that the soft part having worn away from about it,
little Diamond found one night after he lay down, that a knot
had come out of one of them, and that the wind was blowing in
upon him in a cold and rather imperious fashion. Now he had
no fancy for leaving things wrong that might be set right ; so he
jumped out of bed again, got a little strike of hay, twisted it up,
folded it in the middle, and having thus made it into a cork,
stuck it into the hole in the wall. But the wind began to blow
loud and angrily; and as Diamond was 'falling asleep, out blew
his cork and hit him on the nose, just hard enough to wake him
up quite, and let him hear the wind whistling shrill in the hole.
He searched for his hay-cork, found it, stuck it in harder, and
was just dropping off once more, when, pop! with an angry
whistle behind it, the cork struck him again, this time on the
cheek. Up he rose once more, made a fresh stopple of hay, and
corked the hole severely. But he was hardly down again before
— pop! it came on his forehead. He gave it up, drew the clothes
above his head, and was soon fast asleep.

Although the next day was very stormy, Diamond forgot all
about the hole; for he was busy making a cave by the side of

GEORGE MACDONALD

9467

his mother's fire, — with a broken chair, a three-legged stool, and
a blanket, — and sitting in it. His mother, however, discovered it
and pasted a bit of brown paper over it; so that when Diamond
had snuggled down for the next night, he had no occasion ! to
think of it.

Presently, however, he lifted his head and listened. Who could
that be talking to him? The wind was rising again, and getting
very loud, and full of rushes and whistles. He was sure some
one was talking — and very near him too it was. But he was
not frightened, for he had not yet learned how to be; so he sat
up and hearkened. At last the voice, which though quite gentle
sounded a little angry, appeared to come from the back of the
bed. He crept nearer to it, and laid his ear against the wall.
Then he heard nothing but the wind, which sounded very loud
indeed. The moment, however, that he moved his head from the
wall he heard the voice again, close to his • ear. He felt about
with his hand, and came upon the piece of paper his mother had
pasted over the hole. Against this he laid his ear, and then he
heard the voice quite distinctly. There was in fact a little cor-
ner of the paper loose ; and through that, as from a mouth in
the wall, the voice came.

<(What do you mean, little boy — closing up my window ? "

(< What window ? " asked Diamond.

<(You stuffed hay into it three times last night. I had to
blow it out again three times."

<(You can't mean this little hole! It isn't a window; it's a
hole in my bed."

<( I did not say it was a window : I said it was my window. "

<( But it can't be a window, because windows are holes to see
out of."

<(Well, that's just what I made this window for."

(< But you are outside: you can't want a window."

(<You are quite mistaken. Windows are to see out of, you
say. Well, I'm in my house, and I want , windows to see out
of it.»

"But you've made a window into my bed."

(< Well, your mother has got three windows into my dancing-
room, and you have three into my garret."

<( But I heard father say, when my mother wanted him to
make a window through the wall, that it was against the law,,
for it would look into Mr. Dyves's garden."

9468

GEORGE MACDONALD

The voice laughed.

" The law would have some trouble to catch me ! " it said.

"But if it's not right, you know,* said Diamond, <( that's no
matter. You shouldn't do it.®

<( I am so tall I am above that law, " said the voice.

"You must have a tall house, then," said Diamond.

<(Yes, a tall house: the clouds are inside it."

<(Dear me!" said Diamond, and thought a minute. " I think,
then, you can hardly expect me to keep a window in my bed for
you. Why don't you make a window into Mr. Dyves's bed ? "

"Nobody makes a window into an ash-pit," said the voice
rather sadly : <( I like to see nice things out of my windows. "

" But he must have a nicer bed than I have ; though mine is
very nice — so nice that I couldn't wish a better."

<( It's not the bed I care about: it's what is in it. — But you
just open that window."

"Well, mother says I shouldn't be disobliging; but it's rather
hard. You see the north wind will blow right in my face if I
do."

«I am the North Wind."

<( O-o-oh ! " said Diamond thoughtfully. " Then will you prom-
ise not to blow on my face if I open your window ? "

<( I can't promise that. "

"But you'll give me the toothache. Mother's got it already."

" But what's to become of me without a window ? "

" I'm sure I don't know. All I say is, it will be worse fol
me than for you."

"No, it will not. You shall not be the worse for it — I prom-
ise you that. You will be much the better for it. Just you
believe what I say, and do as I tell you."

"Well, I can pull the clothes over my head," said Diamond;
and feeling with his little sharp nails, he got hold of the open
edge of the paper and tore it off at once.

In came a long whistling spear of cold, and struck his little
naked chest. He scrambled and tumbled in under the bed-clothes,
and covered himself up: there was no paper now between him
and the voice, and he felt a little — not frightened exactly, I told
you he had not learned that yet — but rather queer; for what a
strange person this North Wind must be that lived in the great
house — "called Out-of-Doors, I suppose," thought Diamond — and
made windows into people's beds! But the voice began again;

GEORGE MACDONALD

9469

and he could hear it quite plainly, even with his head under the
bedclothes. It was a still more gentle voice now, although six
times as large and loud as it had been, and he thought it sounded
a little like his mother's.

<( What is your name, little boy ? " it asked.

"Diamond," answered Diamond under the bedclothes.

" What a funny name ! "

"It's a very nice name," returned its owner.

"I don't know that," said the voice.

<(Well, I do," retorted Diamond, a little rudely.

" Do you know to whom you are speaking ? "

"No," said Diamond.

And indeed he did not. For to know a person's name is not
always to know the person's self.

"Then I must not be angry with you. — You had better look
and see, though."

(< Diamond is a very pretty name, " persisted the boy, vexed
that it should not give satisfaction.

(( Diamond is a useless thing, rather," said the voice.

<( That's not true. Diamond is very nice — as big as two — and
so quiet all night! And doesn't he make a jolly row in the morn-
ing, getting up on his four great legs! It's like thunder."

"You don't seem to know what a diamond is."

(< Oh, don't I just! Diamond is a great and good horse; and
he sleeps right under me. He is Old Diamond, and I am Young
Diamond; or if you like it better, — for you're very particular,
Mr. North Wind, — he's Big Diamond, and I'm Little Diamond:
and I don't know which of us my father likes best."

A beautiful laugh, large but very soft and musical, sounded
somewhere beside him; but Diamond kept his head under the
clothes.

<(I'm not Mr. North Wind," said the voice.

<( You told me that you were the North Wind, * insisted Dia-
mond.

"I did not say Mister North Wind," said the voice.

"Well then, I do; for mother tells me I ought to be polite."

"Then let me tell you I don't think it at all polite of you to
say Mister to me."

"Well, I didn't know better. I'm very sorry.0

"But you .ought to know better."

" I don't know that."

9470

GEORGE MACDONALD

<( I do. You can't say it's polite to lie there talking, with
your head under the bedclothes, and never look up to see what
kind of person you are talking to. I want you to come out with
me."

<( I want to go to sleep, " said Diamond, very nearly crying;
for he did not like to be scolded, even when he deserved it.

<(You shall sleep all the better to-morrow night."

<( Besides, " said Diamond, (< you are out in Mr. Dyves's gar-
den, and I can't get there. I can only get into our own yard."

<( Will you take your head out of the bedclothes ? " said the
voice, just a little angrily.

"No!" answered Diamond, half .peevish, half frightened.

The instant he said the word, a tremendous blast of wind
crashed in a board of the wall, and swept the clothes off Dia-
mond. He started up in terror. Leaning over him was the large,
beautiful, pale face of a woman. Her dark eyes looked a little
angry, for they had just begun to flash; but a quivering in her
sweet upper lip made her look as if she were going to cry.
What was most strange was that away from her head streamed
out her black hair in every direction, so that the darkness in the
hay-loft looked as if it were made of her hair; but as Diamond
gazed at her in speechless amazement, mingled with confidence,
— for the boy was entranced with her mighty beauty, — her hair
began to gather itself out of the darkness, and fell down all
about her again, till her face looked 'out of the midst of it like a
moon out of a cloud. From her eyes came all the light by which
Diamond saw her face and her hair; and that was all he did see
of her yet. The wind was over and gone.

<( Will you go with me now, you little Diamond ? I am sorry
I was forced to be so rough with you," said the lady.

" I will ; yes, I will, " answered Diamond, holding out both his
arms. "But," he added, dropping them, <(how shall I get my
clothes? They are in mother's room, and the door is locked."

"Oh, never mind your clothes. You will not be cold. I shall
take care of that. Nobody is cold with the North Wind."

(( I thought everybody was, " said Diamond.

"That is a great mistake. Most people make it, however.
They are cold because they are not with the North Wind, but
without it."

If Diamond had been a little older, and had supposed himself
a good deal wiser, he would have thought the lady was joking.

GEORGE MACDONALD

9471

But he was not older, and did not fancy himself wiser, and there-
fore understood her well enough. Again he stretched out his
arms. The lady's face drew back a little.

(< Follow me, Diamond," she said.

"Yes," said Diamond, only a little ruefully.

(< You're not afraid ? " said the North Wind.

<(No, ma'am: but mother never would let me go without
shoes; she never said anything about clothes, so I daresay she
wouldn't mind that."

(< I know your mother very well, " said the lady. <( She is a
good woman. I have visited her often. I was with her when
you were born. I saw her laugh and cry both at once. I love
your mother, Diamond."

(< How was it you did not know my name, then, ma'am ?
Please, am I to say ma'am to you, ma'am ? "

<(One question at a time, dear boy. I knew your name quite
well, but I wanted to hear what you would say for it. Don't
you remember that day when the man was rinding fault with
your name — how I blew the window in ? "

<( Yes, yes, " answered Diamond eagerly. <( Our window opens
like a door, right over the coach-house door. And the wind —
you, ma'am — came in, and blew the Bible out of the man's
hands, and the leaves went all flutter-flutter on the floor, and
my mother picked it up and gave it back to him open, and
there — "

(<Was your name in the Bible — the sixth stone in the high-
priest's breast-plate. "

<(Oh! a stone, was it?" said Diamond. <( I thought it had
been a horse — I did."

"Never mind. A horse is better than a stone any day. Well,
you see, I know all about you and your mother."

" Yes. I will go with you. "

(<Now for the next question: you're not to call me ma'am.
You must call me just my own name — respectfully, you know —
just North Wind."

"Well, please, North Wind, you are so beautiful, I am quite
ready to go with you."

<(You must not be ready to go with everything beautiful all
at once, Diamond."

"But what's beautiful can't be bad. You're not bad, North
Wind ? »

GEORGE MACDONALP

<(No; I'm not bad. But sometimes beautiful things grow bad
by doing bad, and it takes some time for their badness to spoil
their beauty. So little boys may be mistaken if they go after
things because they are beautiful. >}

<(Well, I will go with you because you are beautiful and good
too. })

(<Ah, but there's another thing, Diamond: What if I should
look ugly without being bad — look ugly myself because I am
making ugly things beautiful ? — what then ? })

a I don't quite understand you, North Wind. You tell me
what then."

<(Well, I will tell you. If you see me with my face all black,
don't be frightened. If you see me flapping wings like a bat's,
as big as the whole sky, don't be frightened. If you hear me
raging ten times worse than Mrs. Bill, the blacksmith's wife, —
even if you see me looking in at people's windows like Mrs. Eve
Dropper, the gardener's wife, — you must believe that I am doing
my work. Nay, Diamond, if I change into a serpent or a tiger,
you must not let go your hold of me, for my hand will never
change in yours if you keep a good hold. If you keep a hold,
you will know who I am all the time, even when you look at
me and can't see me the least like the North Wind. I may
look something very awful. Do you understand ? w

"Quite well,0 said little Diamond.

"Come along then," said North Wind, and disappeared behind
the mountain of hay.

Diamond crept out of bed and followed her.

9473

JEAN MACE

(1815-1894)

JEAN MACE was a benign child-lover, and never lost the
childlike simplicity and zest in life which characterize his
style. He was born in Paris in 1815; and his parents, plain
working-people who were ambitious for their boy, gave him unusual
advantages for one of his class. His course at the College Stanilaus
was not completed without self-sacrifice at home which made him
prize and improve his opportunities. At
twenty-one he became instructor in history
in the same college, and he was teaching
in the College Henri IV., when he was
drafted as a soldier. After three years'
service he was bought out by his friend
and former professor M. Burette, whose pri-
vate secretary he became. Always inter-
ested in politics, and an ardent republican,
he welcomed the revolution of 1848 with
an enthusiasm which involved him in diffi-
culties a few years later. With the restor-
ation of the Empire under Louis Napoleon
he was banished; and in exile, at the age of
thirty-seven, he discovered his true vocation.

The (< Little Chateau, }) at Beblenheim in Alsace, was a private
school for girls, kept by his friend Mademoiselle Verenet, who now
offered Mace a position as teacher of natural science and literature.
He loved to teach, loved to impart fact so that it might exercise a
moral influence upon character; and he was very happy in the calmly
busy life at Beblenheim, where, as he says, <(I was at last in my
true calling. }>

In 1 86 1 he published the (Histoire d'une Bouchee de Pain,' — a
simple yet comprehensive work on physiology, made as delightful as
a story-book to child readers. Its wide popularity both in French,
and in an English translation as ( The Story of a Mouthful of Bread, >
prompted a sequel, < Les Serviteurs de 1'Estomac > (The Servants of
the Stomach), also very successful. But the < Contes du Petit Cha-
teau, > a collection of charming fairy tales written for his little pupils,
is Mace's masterpiece. These stories are simple lessons in thrift,

JEAN MAC£

9474 JEAN MACfi

truth, and generosity, inculcated with dramatic force and imaginat-
ive vigor. Translated as ( Home Fairy Tales, y they have long been
familiar to English and American children.

After ten years at Beblenheim, Mace returned to Paris, where in
company with Stahl he established the popular Magasin d'Education
et de Recreation. One of his strongest desires had always been to
extend educational influences; and for this purpose he established in
1863 the Societe des Bibliotheques Communales du Haut Rhin, and
later organized a League of Instruction for increasing the number of
schools and libraries. He died in 1894.

THE NECKLACE OF TRUTH

From < Mace's Fairy Book.* Translated by Mary L. Booth, and published by

Harper & Brothers

THERE was once a little girl by the name of Coralie, who took
pleasure in telling falsehoods. Some children think very
little of not speaking the truth; and a small falsehood, or a
great one in case of necessity, that saves them from a duty or
a punishment, procures them a pleasure, or gratifies their self-love,
seems to them the most allowable thing in the world. Now
Coralie was one of this sort. The truth was a thing of which
she had no idea; and any excuse was good to her, provided that it
was believed. Her parents were for a long time deceived by her
stories; but they saw at last that she was telling them what was
not true, and from that moment they had not the least confidence
in anything that she said.

It is a terrible thing for parents not to be able to believe
their children's words. It would be better almost to have no
children; for the habit of lying, early acquired, may lead them
in after years to the most shameful crimes: and what parent can
help trembling at the thought that he may be bringing up his
children to dishonor ?

After vainly trying every means to reform her, Coralie's par-
ents resolved to take her to the enchanter Merlin, who was cele-
brated at that time over all the globe, and who was the greatest
friend of truth that ever lived. For this reason, little children
that were in the habit of telling falsehoods were brought to him
from all directions, in order that he might cure them.

The enchanter Merlin lived in a glass palace, the walls of
which were transparent; and never in his whole life had the

JEAN MACE 9475

idea crossed his mind of disguising one of his actions, of causing
others to believe what was not true, or even of suffering them
to believe it by being silent when he might have spoken. He
knew liars by their odor a league off; and when Coralie ap-
proached the palace, he was obliged to burn vinegar to prevent
himself from being ill.

Coralie 's mother, with a beating heart, undertook to explain
the vile disease which had attacked her daughter; and blushingly
commenced a confused speech, rendered misty by shame, when
Merlin stopped her short.

(< I know what is the matter, my good lady," said he. <( I felt
your daughter's approach long ago. She is one of the greatest
liars in the world, and she has made me very uncomfortable. })

The parents perceived that fame had not deceived them in
praising the skill of the enchanter; and Coralie, covered with
confusion, knew not where to hide her head. She took refuge
under the apron of her mother, who sheltered her as well as she
could, terrified at the turn affairs were taking, while her father
stood before her to protect her at all risks. They were very
anxious that their child should be cured, but they wished her
cured gently and without hurting her.

(< Don't be afraid, >} said Merlin, seeing their terror: (< I do not
employ violence in curing these diseases. I am only going to
make Coralie a beautiful present, which I think will not displease
her.»

He opened a drawer, and took from it a magnificent amethyst
necklace, beautifully set, with a diamond clasp of dazzling lustre.
He put it on Coralie's neck, and dismissing the parents with a
friendly gesture, <( Go, good people, >} said he, <( and have no more
anxiety. Your daughter carries with her a sure guardian of the
truth. »

Coralie, flushed with pleasure, was hastily retreating, delighted
at having escaped so easily, when Merlin called her back.

(< In a year, }) said he, looking at her sternly, <( I shall come
for my necklace. Till that time I forbid you to take it off for a
single instant : if you dare to do so, woe be unto you ! w

<(Oh, I ask nothing better than always to wear it, — it is so
beautiful. »

In order that you may know, I will tell you that this neck-
lace was none other than the famous Necklace of Truth, so much
talked of in ancient books, which unveiled every species of false-
hood.

9476 JEAN MACE

The day after Coralie returned home she was sent to school.
As she had long been absent, all the little girls crowded round
her, as always happens in such 'cases. There was a general cry
of admiration at the sight of the necklace.

"Where did it come from?" and "where did you get it ?" was
asked on all sides.

In thos » days, for any one to say that he had been to the
enchanter Merlin's was to tell the whole story, Coralie took
good care not to betray herself in this way.

"I was sick for a long time," said she, boldly; "and on my
recovery my parents gave me this beautiful necklace."

A loud- cry rose from all at once. The diamonds of the clasp,
which had shot forth so brilliant a light, had suddenly become dim,
and were turned to coarse glass.

"Well, yes, I have been sick! What are you making such a fuss
about?"

At this second falsehood, the amethysts in turn changed to ugly
yellow stones. A new cry arose. Coralie, seeing all eyes fixed
on her necklace, looked that way herself, and was struck with
terror.

" I have been to the enchanter Merlin's," said she, humbly,
understanding from what direction the blow came, and not daring
to persist in her falsehood.

Scarcely had she confessed the truth when the necklace recov-
ered all its beauty; but the loud bursts of laughter that sounded
around her mortified her to such a degree that she felt the need
of saying something to retrieve her reputation.

"You do very wrong to laugh," said she, "for he treated us
with the greatest possible respect. He sent his carriage to meet
us at the next town, and you have no idea what a splendid car-
riage it was, — six white horses, pink satin cushions with gold
tassels, to say nothing of the negro coachman with his hair pow-
dered, and the three tall footmen behind! When we reached his
palace, which is all of jasper and porphyry, he came to meet us
at the vestibule, and led us to the dining-room, where stood a
table covered with things that I will not name to you, because
you never even heard speak of them. There was, in the first
place—"

The laughter, which had been suppressed with great difficulty
ever since she commenced this fine story, became at that mo-
ment so boisterous that she stopped in amazement; and casting
her eyes once more on the unlucky necklace, she shuddered

JEAN MACE 9477

anew. At each detail that she had invented, the necklace had
become longer and longer, until it already dragged on the ground.

(<You are stretching the truth, yy cried the little girls.

"Well, I confess it: we went on foot, and only stayed five
minutes. "

The necklace instantly shrunk to its proper size.

"And the necklace — the necklace — where did it come from?*

"He gave it to me without saying a word; probabl — "

She had not time to finish. -The fatal necklace grew shorter
and shorter till it choked her terribly, and she gasped for want
of breath.

<( You are keeping back part of the truth, " cried her school-
fellows.

She hastened to alter the broken words while she could still
speak.

(( He said — that I was — one of the greatest — liars — in the
world. "

Instantly freed from the pressure that was strangling her, she
continued to cry with pain and mortification.

<( That was why he gave me the necklace. He said that it
was a guardian of the truth, and I have been a great fool to be
proud of it. Now I am in a fine position ! "

Her little companions had compassion on her grief; for they
were good girls, and they reflected how they should feel in her
place. You can imagine, indeed, that it was somewhat embar-
rassing for a girl to know that she could never more pervert the
truth.

"You are very good," said one of them. "If I were in your
place, I should soon send back the necklace: handsome as it is,
it is a great deal too troublesome. What hinders you from tak-
ing it off?"

Poor Coralie was silent; but the stones began to dance up and
down, and to make a terrible clatter.

<c There is something that you have not told us," said the little
girls, their merriment restored by this extraordinary dance.

" I like to wear it. "

The diamonds and amethysts danced and clattered worse than
ever.

"There is a reason which you are hiding from us."

"Well, since I can conceal nothing from you, he forbade me
to take it off, under penalty of some great calamity."

9478 JEAN

You can imagine that with a companion of this kind, which
turned dull whenever the wearer did not tell the truth, which
grew longer whenever she added to it, which shrunk whenever
she subtracted from it, and which danced and clattered whenever
she was silent, — a companion, moreover, of which she could not
rid herself, — it was impossible even for the most hardened liar
not to keep closely to the truth. When Coralie once was fully
convinced that falsehood was useless, and that it would be in-
stantly discovered, it was not difficult for her to abandon it. The
consequence was, that when she became accustomed always to
tell the truth, she found herself so happy in it — she felt her
conscience so light and her mind so calm — that she began to
abhor falsehood for its own sake, and the necklace had nothing
more to do. Long before the year had passed, therefore, Merlin
came for his necklace, which he needed for another child that
was addicted to lying, and whioh, thanks to his art, he knew
was of no more use to Coralie.

No one can tell me what has become of this wonderful Neck-
lace of Truth; but it is thought that 'Merlin's heirs hid it after
his death, for fear of the ravages that it might cause on earth.
You can imagine what a calamity it would be to many people —
I do not speak only of children — if they were forced to wear it.
Some travelers who have returned from Central Africa declare
that they have seen it on the neck of a negro king, who knew
not how to lie; but they have never been able to prove their
words. Search is still being made for it, however; and if I were
a little child in the habit of telling falsehoods, I should not feel
quite sure that it might not some day be found again.

MACHIAVELLI

9479

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

(1469-1527)

BY CHARLES P. NEILL

IICCOLO MACHIAVELLI, perhaps the greatest prose writer of the
Italian Renaissance, was born in Florence May 3d, 1469, and
died there June 22d, 1527. He was of ancient and distin-
guished lineage on both his father's and his mother's side, and many
of his more immediate ancestors had been honored by republican
Florence with high offices of State. His father Bernardo was a re-
spectable jurist, who to a moderate income from his profession added
a small revenue from some landed possessions. His mother was a
woman of culture, and a poet of some ability.

Of Niccolo's early life and education we know nothing. No trace
of him remains previous to his twenty-sixth year. But of his times
and the scenes amid which he grew up, we know much. It was the
calm but demoralizing era of Lorenzo the Magnificent, when the
sturdy Florentine burghers rested satisfied with magnificence in lieu
of freedom, and, intoxicated with the spirit of a pagan renaissance,
abandoned themselves to the refinements of pleasure and luxury; —
when their streets had ceased for a while to re-echo with the clash
of steel and the fierce shouts of contending factions, and resounded
with the productions of Lorenzo's melodious but indecent Muse.
Machiavelli was a true child of his time. He too was thoroughly
imbued with the spirit of the Renaissance; and looked back, fasci-
nated, on the ideals of that ancient world that was being revivified
for the men of his day. But philosophy, letters, and art were not the
only heritage that the bygone age had handed down; politics — the
building of States and of empire — this also had engaged the minds
of the men of that age, and it was this aspect of their activity that
fired the imagination of the young Florentine. From his writings we
know he was widely read in the Latin and Italian classics. But Vir-
gil and Horace appealed to him less than Livy, and Dante the poet
was less to him than Dante the politician; for he read his classics,
not as others, to drink in their music or be led captive by their
beauty, but to derive lessons in statecraft, and penetrate into the
secrets of the successful empire-builders of the past. It is equally

9480

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

certain, from a study of his works, that he had not mastered Greek.
Like Ariosto, Machiavelli was indebted for his superb literary tech-
nique solely to the study of the literature of his own nation.

With the expulsion of the Medici from Florence, Machiavelli, at
the age of thirty, emerged from obscurity to play a most important
role in the Florentine politics of the succeeding decade and a half.
In 1498 he was elected secretary to the Ten of War and Peace, — a
commission performing the functions of a ministry of war and of
home affairs, and having in addition control of the Florentine diplo-
matic service. From 1498 to 1512 Machiavelli was a zealous, patriotic,
and indefatigable servant of the republic. His energy was untiring,
his activity ceaseless and many-sided. He conducted the voluminous
diplomatic correspondence devolving upon his bureau, drew up me-
morials and plans in affairs of State for the use and guidance of the
Ten, undertook the reorganization of the Florentine troops, and went
himself on a constant succession of embassies, ranging in importance
from those to petty Italian States up to those to the court of France
and of the Emperor. He was by nature well adapted to the peculiar
needs of the diplomacy of that day; and the training he received in
that school must in turn have reacted on him to confirm his native
bent, and accentuate it until it became the distinguishing character-
istic of the man. His first lessons in politics and statecraft were
derived from Livy's history of the not over-scrupulous Romans; and
when he comes to take his lessons at first hand, it is in the midst
of the intrigues of republican Florence, or at the court of a Caterina
Sforza, or in the camp of a Cesare Borgia. Small wonder that his
conception of politics should have omitted to take account of hon-
esty and the moral law; and that he conceived <(the idea of giving
to politics an assured and scientific basis, treating them as having
a proper and distinct value of their own, entirely apart from their
moral value. }>

During this period of his political activity, we have a large num-
ber of State papers and private letters from his pen; and two works
of literary cast have also come down to us. These are his ( Decen-
nale * : historic narratives, cast into poetic form, of Italian events.
The first treats of the decade beginning 1494; and the second, an
unfinished fragment, of the decade beginning 1504. They are written
in easy terzine; and unfeigned sorrow for the miseries of Italy, torn
by internal discord, alternates with cynical mockery and stinging wit.
They are noteworthy as expressing the sentiment for a united Italy.
A third literary work of this period has been lost: (Le Maschere,* a
satire modeled upon the comedies of Aristophanes.

When in 1512, after their long exile, the Medici returned to Flor-
ence in the train of her invader, Machiavelli, though not unwilling

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

to serve the restored rulers, was dismissed from his office and ban-
ished for a year from the confines of the city. Later, on suspicion
of being concerned in a plot against the Medici, he was thrown into
prison and tortured. He was soon afterward included in a gen-
eral pardon granted by the Cardinal de' Medici, then become Leo
X. But notwithstanding Machiavelli's earnest and persistent efforts
to win the good graces of the ruling family, he did not return to
public life until 1525; and this interval of enforced leisure from
affairs of State was the period of his literary activity. A number of
comedies, minor poems, and short prose compositions did not rise
above mediocrity. They were for the most part translations from
the classics, or imitations; and the names are hardly worth recount-
ing. But in one dramatic effort he rose to the stature of genius.
His ( Mandragola > achieved a flattering success both at Rome and in
Florence. It has been pronounced the finest comedy of the Italian
stage, and Macaulay rated it as inferior only to the greatest of
Moliere's. In its form, its spontaneity, vivacity, and wit, it is not
surpassed by Shakespeare; but it is a biting satire on religion and
morality, with not even a hint of a moral to redeem it. Vice is
made humorous, and virtue silly ; its satire is (< deep and murderous >} ;
and its plot too obscene to be narrated. In it Machiavelli has har-
nessed Pegasus to a garbage cart.

His lesser prose works are — the (Life of Castruccio Castracani,'
a <( politico-military romance }) made up partly from incidents in the
life of that hero, and partly from incidents taken from Diodorus Sicu-
lus's life of Agathocles, and concluding with a series of memorable
sayings attributed to Castruccio, but taken from the apophthegms of
Plutarch and Diogenes Laertius; and the (Art of War,* a treatise
anticipating much of our modern tactics, and inveighing against the
mediaeval system of mercenary troops of mail-clad men and horses.
A more ambitious undertaking, and in fact his largest work, is the
< History of Florence.* At the suggestion of the Cardinal de' Medici,
the directors of the studio of Florence commissioned Machiavelli to
employ himself in writing a history of Florence, (( from whatever
period he might think fit to select, and either in the Latin or the
Tuscan tongue, according to his taste. » He was to receive one hun-
dred florins a year for two years to enable him to pursue the work.
He chose his native tongue; and revised and polished his work until
it became a model of style, and in its best passages justifies his claim
to the title of the best and most finished of Italian prose writers.
He thus describes the luring of Giuliano de' Medici to his place of
assassination: —

<(This arrangement having been determined upon, they went into the
church, where the Cardinal had already arrived with Lorenzo de' Medici. The

9482

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

church was crowded with people, and divine service had already commenced;
but Giuliano had not yet come. Francesco dei Pazzi, therefore, together with
Bernardo, who had been designated to kill Giuliano, went to his house, and by
artful persuasion induced him to go to the church. It is really a noteworthy
fact that so much hatred and the thoughts of so great an outrage could be
concealed under so much resoluteness of heart, as was the case with Francesco
and Bernardo; for on the way to church, and even after having entered it, they
entertained him with merry jests and youthful chatter. And Francesco, even,
under pretense of caressing him, felt him with his hands and pressed him in
his arms, for the purpose of ascertaining whether he wore a cuirass or any
other means of protection under his garments. })

But though Machiavelli had the historical style, he lacked histori-
cal perspective; he arranged his matter not according to objective
value, but placed in the boldest relief those events that best lent
support to his own theories of politics and statecraft. He makes his
facts to be as he wishes them, rather than as he knows them to be.
He wishes to throw .contempt on mercenary troops, and though he
knows an engagement to have been bloody, prefers for his descrip-
tion such a conclusion as this: — <(In the tremendous defeat that was
noised throughout Italy, no one perished excepting Ludovico degli
Obizzi and two of his men, who being thrown from their horses were
smothered in the mud." To Machiavelli history was largely to be
written as a tendenz roman, — manufactured to point a preconceived
moral.

Though Machiavelli wrote history, poetry, and comedy, it is not
by these he is remembered. The works that have made his name a
synonym, and given it a place in every tongue, are the two works
written almost in the first year of his retirement from political
life. These are < The Prince ) and the < Discourses on the First Ten
Books of Titus Livius.' Each is a treatise on statecraft; together they
form a complete and unified treatise, and represent an attempt to for-
mulate inductively a science of politics. The ( Discourses ) study
republican institutions, <The Prince* monarchical ones. The first is
the more elementary, and would come first in logical arrangement.
But in the writing of them Machiavelli had in view more than the
foundation of a science of politics. He was anxious to win the
favor of the Medici; and as these were not so much interested in
how republics are best built up, he completed c The Prince ) first, and
sent it forth dedicated <(to the magnificent Lorenzo, son of Piero de*
Medici. »

In the < Discourses, > the author essays <(a new science of states-
manship, based on the experience of human events and history. w In
that day of worship of the ancient world, Machiavelli endeavors to
draw men to a study of its politics as well as its art. In Livy he
finds the field for this study.

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI 9483

«When we consider the general respect for antiquity, and how often — to
say nothing of other examples — a great price is paid for some fragments of
an antique statue which we are anxious to possess to ornament our houses
with, or to give to artists who strive to imitate them in their own works;
and when we see, on the other hand, the wonderful examples which the his-
tory of ancient kingdoms and republics presents to us, the prodigies of virtue
and of wisdom displayed by the kings, captains, citizens, and legislators who
have sacrificed themselves for their country: when we see these, I say, more
admired than imitated, or so much neglected that not the least trace of this
ancient virtue remains, — we cannot but be at the same time as much sur-
prised as afflicted; the more so as in the differences which arise between
citizens, or in the maladies to which they are subjected, we see these same
people have recourse to the judgments and the remedies prescribed by the
ancients. The civil laws are in fact nothing but the decisions given by their
jurisconsults, and which, reduced to a system, direct our modern jurists in
their decisions. And what is the science of medicine but the experience of
ancient physicians, which their successors have taken for a guide ? And yet
to found a republic, maintain States, to govern a kingdom, organize an army,
conduct a war, dispense justice, and extend empires, you will find neither
prince nor republic, nor captain, nor citizen, who has recourse to the exam-
ples of antiquity !»

In his commentary on the course of Romulus in the founding
of Rome, we find the keynote of Machiavelli's system of political
science. His one aim is the building of a State; his one thought,
how best to accomplish his aim. Means are therefore to be selected,
and to be judged, solely as regards their effectiveness to trie business
in hand. Ordinary means are of course to be preferred ; but extraor-
dinary must be used when needed.

« Many will perhaps consider it an evil example that the founder of a civil
society, as Romulus was, should first have killed his brother, and then have
consented to the death of Titus Tatius, who had been elected to share the
royal authority with him; from which it might be concluded that the citizens,
according to the example of their prince, might, from ambition and the desire
to rule, destroy those who attempt to oppose their authority. This opinion
would be correct, if we do not take into consideration the object which Rom-
ulus had in view in committing that homicide. But we must assume, as a
general rule, that it never or rarely happens that a republic or monarchy is
well constituted, or its old institutions entirely reformed, unless it is done by
only one individual; it is even necessary that he whose mind has conceived
such a constitution should be alone in carrying it into effect. A sagacious
legislator of a republic, therefore, whose object is to promote the public good
and not his private interests, and who prefers his country to his own succes-
sors, should concentrate all authority in himself; and a wise mind will never
censure any one for having employed any extraordinary means for the purpose
of establishing a kingdom or constituting a republic. It is well that when the
act accuses him, the result should excuse ; and when the result is good, as in
the case of Romulus, it will always absolve him from blame. w

9484

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

In an equally scientific and concise manner he analyzes the meth-
ods of preventing factions in a republic.

«We observe, from the example of the Roman consuls in restoring harmony
between the patricians and plebeians of Ardea, the means for obtaining that
object, which is none other than to kill the chiefs of the opposing factions. In
fact, there are only three ways of accomplishing it: the one is to put the
leaders to death, as the Romans did; or to banish them from the city; or to
reconcile them to each other under a pledge not to offend again. Of these
three ways, the last is the worst, being the least certain and effective. »

In (The Prince, } a short treatise of twenty-six chapters, and mak-
ing little more than a hundred octavo pages, Machiavelli gives more
succinct and emphatic expression to the principles of his new polit-
ical science. ( The Prince > is the best known of all his works. It is
the one always connected with his name, and which has made his
name famous. It was said of the poet Gray that no other man had
walked down the aisle of fame with so small a book under his arm.
It might be repeated as truly of Machiavelli. Men, he has said,
(< preferred infamy to oblivion, for at least infamy served to transmit
their names to posterity. w Had he written (The Prince } to escape
oblivion, the fullest measure of his desire would have been attained.
For the model of his prince, Machiavelli took Cesare Borgia, and cites
him as an example worthy of imitation; and he has shared in the
execration *hat posterity has heaped upon Borgia.

The fifteenth and eighteenth chapters of <The Prince > contain a
formulation of the principles that have brought down condemnation
on their author.

«The manner in which men live is so different from the way in which
they ought to live, that he who leaves the common course for that which he
ought to follow will find that it leads him to ruin rather than to safety. For
a man who in all respects will carry out only his professions of good, will be
apt to be ruined amongst so many who are evil. A prince therefore who
desires to maintain himself, must learn to be not always good, but to be so
or not as necessity may require. . . . For, all things considered, it will be
found that some things that seem like virtue will lead you to ruin if you fol-
low them; whilst others that apparently are vices will, if followed, result in
your safety and well-being. »

And again: —

<( It must be evident to every one that it is more praiseworthy for a prince
always to maintain good faith, and practice integrity rather than craft and de-
ceit. And yet the experience of our own times has shown that those princes
have achieved great things who made small account of good faith, and who
understood by cunning to circumvent the intelligence of others; and that in

NICCOLO MACHIAVELL1

9485

the end they got the better of those -whose actions were dictated by loyalty
and good faith. You must know, therefore, that there are two ways of carry-
ing on a contest: the one by law, and the other by force. The first is prac-
ticed by men, and the other by animals; and as the first is often insufficient,
it becomes necessary to resort to the second.

«A prince then should know how to employ the nature of man, and that
of the beast as well. ... A prince should be a fox, to know the traps
and snares ; and a lion, to be able to frighten the wolves : for those who simply
hold to the nature of the lion do not understand their business.

<(A sagacious prince, then, cannot and should not fulfill his pledges when
their observance is contrary to his interest, and when the causes that induced
him to pledge his faith rfo longer exist. If men were all good, then indeed
this precept would be bad; but as men are naturally bad, and will not observe
their faith towards you, you must in the same way not observe yours towards
them: and no prince ever yet lacked legitimate reasons with which to color
his want of good faith. . . .

«It is not necessary, however, for a prince to possess all the above-men-
tioned qualities; but it is essential that he should at least seem to have them.
I will even venture to say, that to have and to practice them constantly is
pernicious, but to seem to have them is useful. For instance, a prince should
seem to be merciful, faithful, humane, religious, and upright, and should even
be so in reality; but he should have his mind so trained that, when occasion
requires it, he may know how to change to the opposite. And it must be
understood that a prince, and especially one who has but recently acquired
his state, cannot perform all those things which cause men to be esteemed as
good; he being often obliged, for the sake of maintaining his state*, to act con-
trary to humanity, charity, and religion. And therefore it is necessary that he
should have a versatile mind, capable of changing readily, according as the
winds and changes bid him; and as has been said above, not to swerve from
the good if possible, but to know how to resort to evil if necessity demands it.>J

And yet in these same books we find expressions worthy of a
moralist.

(< All enterprises to be undertaken should be for the honor of God and the
general good of the country. »

«In well-constituted governments, the citizens fear more to break their
oaths than the laws; because they esteem the power of God more than that
of men.)>

« Even in war, but little glory is derived from any fraud that involves the
breaking of a given pledge and of agreements made.**

« It is impossible to believe that either valor or anything praiseworthy can
result from a dishonest education, or an impure and immodest mmd.»

The strangest moral contradictions abound throughout (The Prince,'
as they do in all Machiavelli's writings. He is saint or devil accord-
ing as you select your extracts from his writings. Macaulay has
given us a perfect characterization of the man and his works.

9486

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

« In all the writings which he gave to the public, and in all those which
the research of editors has in the course of three centuries discovered: in
his comedies, designed for the entertainment of the' multitude; in his com-
ments on Livy, intended for the perusal of the most enthusiastic patriots of
Florence; in his < History, > inscribed to one of the most amiable and esti-
mable of the popes; in his public dispatches; in his private memoranda, —
the same obliquity of moral principle for which <The Prince > is so severely
censured, is more or less discernible. We doubt whether it would be possi-
ble to find, in all the many volumes of his compositions, a single expression
indicating that dissimulation and treachery had ever struck him as discredit-
able.

« After this, it may seem ridiculous to say that we are acquainted with
few writings which exhibit so much elevation of sentiment, so pure and
warm a zeal for the public good, or so just a view of the duties and rights
of citizens, as those of Machiavelli. Yet so it is. And even from <The Prince >
itself, we could select many passages in support of this remark. To a reader
of our age and country, this inconsistency is at first perfectly bewildering.
The whole man seems to be an enigma; a grotesque assemblage of incongru-
ous qualities ; selfishness and generosity, cruelty and benevolence, craft and
simplicity, abject villainy and romantic heroism. One sentence is such as a
veteran diplomatist would scarcely write in cipher for the direction of his
most confidential spy; the next seems to be extracted from a theme composed
by an ardent schoolboy on the death of Leonidas. An act of dexterous per-
fidy, and an act of patriotic self-devotion, call forth the same kind and the
same degree of respectful admiration. The moral sensibility of the writer
seems at once to be morbidly obtuse and morbidly acute. Two characters
altogether dissimilar are united in him. They are not merely joined, but in-
terwoven. They are the warp and the woof of his mind.**

In consequence of this, no writer has been more condemned or
more praised than Machiavelli. Shakespeare, reflecting English
thought, uses his name as the superlative for craft and murderous
treachery. But later years have raised up defenders for him, and his
rehabilitation is still going on. He has been lauded as <( the noblest
and purest of patriots }) ; and more ardent admirers could <( even praise
his generosity, nobility, and exquisite delicacy of mind, and go so far
as to declare him an incomparable model of public and private vir-
tue.w In 1787, after his dust had lain for nearly three centuries in an
obscure tomb beside that of Michelangelo, a monument was erected
above him, with the inscription given below,

TANTO NOMINI NULLUM PAR EULOGIUM
NICOLANO MACHIAVELLUS

[No eulogy could add aught to so great a name as that of Niccolo
Machiavelli.]

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI 9487

In 1859 the government of his native Tuscany itself gave his works
to the public in a complete edition. And in 1869 the Italian govern-
ment enrolled him in its calendar of great ones; and placed above
the door of the house in Florence in which he lived and died, a mar-
ble tablet, inscribed —

A NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

Dell' Unita Nazionale Precursore audace e indovino

E d'Armi proprie e non aventizie primo Institutore e Maestro

L'ltalia Una e Armata pose il 3 Maggio 1869

IL QUARTO DI Lui CENTENNARIO

[To Niccolo Machiavelli — the intrepid and prophetic Precursor of National
Unity, and the first Institutor and Master of her own Armies in place
of adventitious ones — United and Armed Italy places this on May 3ds
1869, his Fourth Centenary.]

His rehabilitation proceeds from two causes. Later research has
shown that perhaps he only reflected his time; and his works breathe
a passionate longing for that Italian unity which in our day has been
realized. He may be worthy canonization as a national saint; but
those who are more interested in the integrity of moral standards
than in Italian unity will doubtless continue to refuse beatification to
one who indeed knew the Roman virtus, but was insensible to the
nature of virtue as understood by the followers of Christ. And no
amount of research into the history of his age can make his princi-
ples less vicious in themselves. A better understanding of his day
can only lessen the boldness of the relief in which he has heretofore
stood out in history. He was probably no worse than many of his
fellows. He only gave a scientific formulation to their practices. He
dared openly to avow and justify the principles that their actions
implied. They paid to virtue the court of hypocrisy, and like the
Pharisee of the earlier time, preached righteousness and did evil; but
Machiavelli was more daring, and when he served the devil, disdained
to go about his business in the livery of heaven.

9488 NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

THE CONSPIRACY AGAINST CARLO GALEAZZO, DUKE
OF MILAN, 1476

From the ( History of Florence >

WHILST the- transactions between the King and the Pope
were in progress, and those in Tuscany, in the manner
we have related, an event of greater importance occurred
in Lombardy. Cola Montana, a learned and ambitious man, taught
the Latin language to the youth of the principal families in Mi-
lan. Either out of hatred to the character and manners of the
duke, or from some other cause, he constantly deprecated the
condition of those who live under a bad prince; calling those
glorious and happy who had the good fortune to be born and
live in a republic. He endeavored to show that the most cele-
brated men had been produced in republics, and not reared
under princes; that the former cherish virtue, whilst the latter
destroy it; the one deriving advantage from virtuous men, whilst
the latter naturally fear them. The youths with whom he was
most intimate were Giovanni Andrea Lampognano, Carlo Vis-
conti, and Girolamo Olgiato. He frequently discussed with
them the faults of their prince, and the wretched condition of
those who were subject to him ; and by constantly inculcating his
principles, acquired such an ascendency over their minds as to
induce them to bind themselves by oath to effect the duke's de-
struction, as soon as they became old enough to attempt it.
Their minds being fully occupied with this design, which grew
with their years, the duke's conduct and their own private inju-
ries served to hasten its execution. Galeazzo was licentious and
cruel; of .both which vices he had given such repeated proofs
that he became odious to all. . . . These private injuries
increased the young men's desire for vengeance, and the deliv-
erance of their country from so many evils; trusting that when-
ever they should succeed in destroying the duke, many of the
nobility and all the people would rise in their defense. Being
resolved upon their undertaking, they were often together; which,
on account of their long intimacy, did not excite any suspicion.
They frequently discussed the subject; and in order to familiar-
ize their minds with the deed itself, they practiced striking each
other in the breast and in the side with the sheathed daggers
intended to be used for the purpose. On considering the most
suitable time and place, the castle seemed insecure; during the

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

9489

chase, uncertain and dangerous; whilst going about the city for
his own amusement, difficult if not impracticable; and at a ban-
quet, of doubtful result. They therefore determined to kill him
upon the occasion of some procession or public festivity, when
there would be no doubt of his presence, and where they might
under various pretexts assemble their friends. It was also re-
solved that if one of their number were prevented from attend-
ing, on any account whatever, the rest should put him to death
in the midst of their armed enemies.

It was now the close of the year 1476, — near Christmas; and
as it was customary for the duke to go upon St. Stephen's day,
in great solemnity, to the church of that martyr, they considered
this the most suitable opportunity for the execution of their de- •
sign. Upon the morning of that day they ordered some of their
most trusty friends and servants to arm, telling them they wished
to go to the assistance of Giovanandrea, who, contrary to the wish
of some of his neighbors, intended to turn a water-course into
his estate; but that before they went they wished to take leave
of the prince. They also assembled, under various pretenses,
other friends and relatives; trusting that when the deed was ac-
complished, every one would join them in the completion of their
enterprise. It was their intention, after the duke's death, to col-
lect their followers together and proceed to those parts of the
city where they imagined the plebeians would be most disposed
to take arms against the duchess and the principal ministers of
State: and they thought the people, on account of the famine
which then prevailed, would easily be induced to follow them;
for it was their design to give up the houses of Cecco Simonetta,
Giovanni Botti, and Francesco Lucani, — all leading men in the
government, — to be plundered, and by this means gain over the
populace and restore liberty to the community. With these ideas,
and with minds resolved upon their execution, Giovanandrea and
the rest were early at the church, and heard mass together; after
which Giovanandrea, turning to a statue of St. Ambrose, said,
<(O patron of our city! thou knowest our intention, and the end ,
we would attain by so many dangers: favor our enterprise, and
prove, by protecting the oppressed, that tyranny is offensive to
thee.»

To the duke, on the other hand, when intending to go to the
church, many omens occurred of his approaching death ; for in the
morning, having put on a cuirass, as was his frequent custom, he

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

immediately took it off again, either because it inconvenienced
him or that he did not like its appearance. He then wished to
hear mass in the castle; but found that the priest who officiated
in the chapel had gone to St. Stephen's, and taken with him the
sacred utensils. On this he desired the service to be performed
by the Bishop of Como, ' who acquainted him with preventing
circumstances. Thus, almost compelled, he determined to go to
the church; but before his departure he caused his sons, Giovan
Galeazzo and Ermes, to be brought to him, and embraced and
kissed them several times, seeming reluctant to part with them.
He then left the castle, and with the ambassadors of Ferrara and
Mantua on either hand, proceeded to St. Stephen's.

The conspirators, to avoid exciting suspicion, and to escape
the cold, which was very severe, had withdrawn to an apart-
ment of the arch-priest, who was a friend of theirs; but hearing
the duke's approach, they came into the church, Giovanandrea
and Girolamo placing themselves upon the right hand of the en-
trance and Carlo on the left. Those who led the procession
had already entered, and were followed by the duke, surrounded
by such a multitude as is usual on similar occasions. The first
attack was made by Lampognano and Girolamo; who, pretending
to clear the way for the prince, came close to him, and grasping
their daggers, which being short and sharp were concealed in the
sleeves of their vests, struck at him. Lampognano gave him
two wounds, one in the belly, the other in the throat. Girolamo
struck him in the throat and breast. Carlo Visconti, being nearer
the door, and the duke having passed, could not wound him in
front; but with two strokes transpierced his shoulder and spine.
These six wounds were inflicted so instantaneously that the duke
had fallen before any one was aware of what had happened; and
he expired, having only once ejaculated the name of the Virgin,
as if imploring her assistance.

A great tumult immediately ensued; several swords were
drawn; and as often happens in sudden emergencies, some fled
from the church and others ran towards the scene of tumult,
both without any definite motive or knowledge of what had oc-
curred. Those, however, who were nearest the duke and had
seen him slain, recognizing the murderers, pursued them. Gio-
vanandrea, endeavoring to make his way out of the church, had
to pass among the women, who being numerous, and according
to their custom seated upon the ground, impeded his progress

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

949 1

by their apparel; and being overtaken, he was killed by a Moor,
one of the duke's footmen. Carlo was slain by those who were
immediately around him. Girolamo Olgiato passed through the
crowd, and got out of the church; but seeing his companions
dead, and not knowing where else to go, he went home, where
his father and brothers refused to receive him; his mother only,
having compassion on her son, recommended him to a priest,
an old friend of the family, who, disguising him in his own ap-
parel, led him to his house. Here he remained two days, not
without hope that some disturbance might arise in Milan which
would contribute to his safety. This not occurring, and appre-
hensive that his hiding-place would be discovered, he endeavored
to escape in disguise; but being observed, he was given over to
justice, and disclosed all the particulars of the conspiracy. Giro-
lamo was twenty-three years of age, and exhibited no less com-
posure at his death than resolution in his previous conduct; for
being stripped of his garments, and in the hands of the execu-
tioner, who stood by with the sword unsheathed ready to deprive
him of life, he repeated the following words in the Latin tongue,
in which he was well versed: « Mors acerba, fama perpetua, stabit
vetus memoria facti.^*

The enterprise of these unfortunate young men was conducted
with secrecy and executed with resolution; and they failed for
want of the support of those whom they expected to rise in
their defense. Let princes therefore learn to live so as to ren-
der themselves beloved and respected by their subjects, that none
may have hope of safety after having destroyed them ; and let
others see how vain is the expectation which induces them to
trust so much to the multitude as to believe that even when
discontented, they will either embrace their cause or ward off
their dangers. This event spread consternation all over Italy;
but those which shortly afterwards occurred in Florence caused
much more alarm, and terminated a peace of twelve years' con-
tinuance. Having commenced with blood and horror, they will
have a melancholy and tearful conclusion.

* « Death is bitter, but fame is eternal, and the memory of this deed shall
long endure. w

9492 NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

HOW A PRINCE OUGHT TO AVOID FLATTERERS
From <The Prince >

I MUST not forget to mention one evil against which princes
should ever be upon their guard, and which they cannot
avoid except by the greatest prudence; and this evil is the
flattery which reigns in every court. Men have so much self'
love, and so good an opinion of themselves, that it is very diffi'
cult to steer clear of such contagion; and besides, in endeavoring
to avoid it, they run the risk of being despised.

For princes have no other way of expelling flatterers than by
showing that the truth will not offend. Yet if every one had the
privilege of uttering his sentiments with impunity, what would
become of the respect due to the majesty of the sovereign ? A
prudent prince should take a middle course, and make choice of
some discreet men in his State, to whom alone he may give the
liberty of telling him the truth on such subjects as he shall
request information upon from them. ' He ought undoubtedly to
interrogate them and "hear their opinions upon every subject of
importance, and determine afterwards according to his own
judgment; conducting himself at all times in such a manner as
to convince every one that the more freely they speak the more
acceptable they will be. After which he should listen to nobody
else, but proceed firmly and steadily in the execution of what he
has determined.

A prince who acts otherwise is either bewildered by the adu-
lation of flatterers, or loses all respect and consideration by the
uncertain and wavering conduct he is obliged to pursue. This
doctrine can be supported by an instance from the history of our
own times. Father Luke said of the Emperor Maximilian, his
master, now on the throne, that ((he never took counsel of any
person, and notwithstanding he never acted from an opinion of
his own }> ; and in this he adopted a method diametrically opposite
to that which I have proposed. For as this prince never in-
trusted his designs to any of his ministers, their suggestions were
not made till the very moment when they should be executed; so
that, pressed by the exigencies of the moment, and overwhelmed
with obstacles and unforeseen difficulties, he was obliged to yield
to whatever opinions his ministers might offer. Hence it hap-
pens, that what he does one day he is obliged to cancel the next;

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

and thus nobody can depend on his decisions, for it is impossible
to know what will be his ultimate determination.

A prince ought to take the opinions of others in everything,
but only at such times as it pleases himself, and not whenever
they are obtruded upon him; so that no one shall presume to
give him advice when he does not request it. He ought to be
inquisitive, and listen with attention; and when he sees any one
hesitate to tell him the full truth, he ought to evince the utmost
displeasure at such conduct.

Those are much mistaken who imagine that a prince who
listens to the counsel of others will be but little esteemed, and
thought incapable of acting on his own judgment. It is an infal-
lible rule that a prince who does not possess an intelligent mind
of his own can never be well advised, unless he is entirely gov-
erned by the advice of an able minister, on whom he may repose
the whole cares of government; but in this case he runs a great
risk of being stripped of his authority by the very person to whom
he has so indiscreetly confided his power. And if instead of one
counselor he has several, how can he, ignorant and uninformed
as he is, conciliate the various and opposite opinions of those
ministers, — who are probably more intent on their own interests
than those of the State, and that without his suspecting it ?

Besides, men who are naturally wicked incline to good only
when they are compelled to it; whence we may conclude that
good counsel, come from what quarter it may, is owing entirely
to the wisdom of the prince, and the wisdom of the prince does
not arise from the goodness of the counsel.

EXHORTATION TO LORENZO DE' MEDICI TO DELIVER ITALY
FROM FOREIGN DOMINATION

From closing chapter of ( The Prince >

IF IT was needful that Israel should be in bondage to Egypt,
to display the quality of Moses; that the Persians should be
overwhelmed by the Medes, to bring out the greatness and
the valor of Cyrus; that the Athenians should be dispersed, to
make plain the superiority of Theseus, — so at present, to illumi-
nate the grandeur of one Italian spirit, it was Doubtless needful
that Italy should be sunk to her present state, — a worse slavery
than that of the Jews, more thoroughly trampled down than the

NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI

Persians, more scattered than the Athenians; without a head,
without public order, conquered and stripped, lacerated, overrun
by her foes, subjected to every form of spoliation.

And though from time to time there has emanated from
some one a ray of hope that he was the one ordained by God
to redeem Italy, yet we have seen how he was so brought to a
standstill at the very height of his success that poor Italy still
remained lifeless, so to speak, and waiting to see who might be
sent to bind up her wounds, to end her despoilment, — the dev-
astation of Lombardy, the plunder and ruinous taxation of the
kingdom of Naples and of Tuscany, — and to heal the sores that
have festered so long. You see how she prays to God that he
may send her a champion to defend her from this cruelty, bar-
barity, and insolence. You see her eager to follow any standard,
if only there is some one to uprear it. But there is no one
at this time to whom she could look more hopefully than to
your illustrious house, O magnificent Lorenzo! which, with its
excellence and prudence, favored by God and the Church, — of
which it is now the head, — could effectively begin her deliver-
ance. . . .

You must not allow this opportunity to pass. Let Italy,
after waiting so long, see her deliverer appear at last. And I
cannot put in words with what affection he would be received in
all the States which have suffered so' long from this inundation
of foreign enemies! with what thirst for vengeance, with what
unwavering loyalty, with what devotion, and with what tears!
What door would be closed to him ? Who would refuse to obey
him ? What envy would dare to contest his place ? What Italian
would refuse him homage ? This supremacy of foreign barbari-
ans is a stench in the nostrils of all!

9494a

PERCY MACKAYE

(1875-)

modern drama since Ibsen has been in large measure realistic
and propagandist. The theatre has been crowded with
problems, sermons, and reforms. Yet during this period,
Romance has refused to leave the stage, and Fancy and Poetry have
piped for many a dance. Ibsen himself wrote (Peer Gynt) as well as
(Ghosts); France has Rostand as well as Brieux; and the new Irish
drama is essentially poetic and romantic. In England, not to speak
of the blank-verse plays of Stephen Phillips and others, the most
popular playwright has been Mr. Barrie who welds sentiment,
whimsy, fantasy, and nonsense into a kind of comedy scarcely
seen since the days of Bottom and Titania. We may leave it
to a future historian to decide where the balance lies between the
realistic and the romantic proclivities of our drama, and to deter-
mine whether Mr. Shaw throws his weight with the serious preacher
or with the ((high fantastical.)) Our concern is merely to note
that our stage has been large enough to afford room for many a flight
of fancy.

In the United States, Mr. Percy Mackaye has been the chief poet
of the theatre, and whether he has written in verse or in prose he has
always contrived to give fancy wing. Sometimes he has gone to the
past for his themes. Chaucer provided his first comedy, (The Canter-
bury Pilgrims) (1903), which after many open-air performances grad-
uated into opera. (Jeanne d'Arc) (1906) and (Sappho and Phaon)

(1907) are two of his early tragedies that won the services of distinguished
actors. But his fancy has not been confined to the great stories of
the past or to the traditional forms of the drama. (The Scarecrow)

(1908) was sub-titled ((a tragedy of the ludicrous)); and a series of one-
act plays was brought together under the title (Yankee Fantasies)
(1912). (Eeny Meeny) has the still more attractive label ((a moon-
shine fantasy,)) and when Mr. Mackaye came to write of (The Immi-
grants) (1915), the result was denominated a ((lyric drama.)) The
mixture of species indicated by these titles is significant of Mr. Mack-
aye's invention, which while variable in purpose, is always seeking to
escape from the stricter limitations of the theatre. He has found a
congenial opportunity in the more spacious stage afforded by the
masques, pageants, and out-of-door performances of civic celebrations.
His (Sanctuary, a Bird Masque) was produced before President Wilson
in 1913; his (St. Louis,) a civic masque, was given in 1914; and his

9494b PERCY MACKAYE

(Caliban,) for the Shakespearian tercentenary, received a stupendous
presentation in New York in 1916.

It would be easy to criticize any of Mr. Mackaye's productions
from the point of view of dramaturgy; but the remarkable fact is that
in so many ways he has succeeded in bringing so varied and so fresh
an invention to the service of the stage. Within the same period,
other men have written more successful plays, and other men have
sustained their fancy in more certain nights. No other man, however,
has so persistently and ingeniously wooed the stage with poetry and
fantasy.

Percy Mackaye, dramatist, son of Steele Mackaye, dramatist, was
born in New York in 1875. Since his graduation from Harvard and
the succeeding years of study and travel abroad, he has practised
assiduously at his high calling. In addition to a large number of
dramatic productions, some of which have been mentioned, he has
written many non-dramatic poems, so that his collected works now
consist of one volume of plays and one of poems. Among the latter
are several read on. special occasions, as (Ticonderoga) (1909), (Ellen
Terry) (1910), (Commodore Peary and his Men) (1910). He has
also published a memoir of his father, several volumes of essays, as
(The Playhouse and the Play) (1909), and' (The Civic Theatre) (1912),
and (with Professor Tatlock) has written (The Modern Reader's
Chaucer) (1912).

FROM (THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS)
Copyright by the Macmillan Co., and reprinted by their permission.

[The scene is at the Tabard Inn; the persons are the pilgrims well known to us
from Chaucer's Prologue to the Canterbury Tales.]

KNIGHT — I am returning from the Holy Land
And go to pay my vows at Canterbury.
This is my son.

Chaucer — Go you to Canterbury

As well, Sir Squire?

[The Squire, putting down his flute, sighs deeply.]

Knight — My son, the gentleman

Accosts thee!
Squire — Noble gentleman — Ah me!

[He turns away.]

PERCY MACKAYE

9494 c

Chaucer [follows him] —

My dearest heart and best beloved foe,

Why liketh you to do me all this woe?

What have I done that grieveth you, or said,

Save that I love and serve you, high and low?

And whilst I 1'ive I will do ever so.

Wherefore, my sweet, do not that I be dead;

For good and fair and gentle as ye be,

It were great wonder if but that ye had

A thousand thousand servants, good and bad:

The most unworthiest servant — I am he!
Squire — Sir, by my lady's grace, you are a poet

And lover, like myself. We shall be brothers.

But pardon, sir, those verses are not yours.

Dan Chaucer wrote, them. Ah, sir, know you Chaucer?
Chaucer — Twelve stone of him!
Squire — Would / did! Is he not

An amorous divinity? Looks he

Like pale Leander, or some ancient god?

Chaucer — Sooth, he is like old Bacchus round the middle.
Squire — How acts he when in love? What feathers wears he?

Doth he sigh oft? What lady doth he serve?

Oh!

[At a smile from Chaucer, he starts back and looks at
him in awe: then hurries to the Knight. Chaucer walks
among the pilgrims, talking with them severally.}

Miller [to Franklin] —

Ten gallon ale? God's arms! I take thee.
Man of Law — What's

The wager?
Franklin — Yonder door; this miller here

Shall break it, at a running, with his head.

The door is oak. The stakes ten gallon ale.
Shipman — Ho, then, I bet the miller shall be drunk.
Merchant - What bet?

Shipman — Twelve crown upon the miller.

Merchant — ' Done.

[At the door appears the Prioress, accompanied by a Nun
and her three priests, one of whom, Joannes, carries a little
pup. The Host hurries up with a reverence.}

Host — Welcome, my lady dear.

Poor Harry Bailey's inn.

Vouchsafe to enter

9494 d PERCY MACKAYE

Progress — Merci.

Host [to a serving-boy] — Knave, show

My lady Prioress to the blue chamber

Where His Majesty, King Richard, slept.
Prioress — Joannes,

Mark, Paulus, stay! have you the little hound

Safe?

Joannes — Yes, my lady.

Prioress — Carry him before,

But carefully.
Miller [to. Yeoman] —

Here, nut-head, hold my hood.
Yeoman — Wilt try bareheaded?
Friar — 'Mass!

Franklin — Ha, for a skull!

Miller, thou art as tough a knot as e'er

The Devil tied. By God, mine ale is spilled.

[The priests and Prioress have just reached the door left
front, which the Miller is preparing to ram.}

Ploughman — The door is locked.

Joannes — But, sir, the Prioress —

Shipman — Heigh! Clear the decks!

[The Miller, with clenched fists and head doubled over,
runs for the door.]

Yeoman — Harrow!

Parson - Run, Robin.

Guild-Men [rise from their dice] — Ho!

[With a crash, the Miller's head strikes the door and splits
it. At the shock, he rebounds against Joannes, and reaching
to save himself from falling, seizes the puppy.]

Miller - A twenty devils!

Guild- Men [all but the Weaver, clambering over the table] -

Come on!

Ploughman [to the Miller] - What aileth thee?

Miller — The priest hath bit my hand.

Joannes - Sweet sir, the puppy -

It was the puppy, sir.

Miller - Wring me its neck.

Prioress — Alas, Joannes — help!

PERCY MACKAYE 9494e

Miller — By Corpus bones!

Give me the cur.

Prioress — St. Loy! Will no one help?

Chaucer — Madame, what may I do?
Prioress — My little hound —

The churl — My little hound! The churl will hurt it.

If you would fetch to me my little hound —
Chaucer -• — Madame, I'd fetch you Cerberus from hell.
Miller — Lo, masters! See a dog's neck wrung!

Chaucer [breaking through the crowd, seizes the Miller by the throat] —

Which dog's?

Miller — - Leave go! — 'Sdeath! Take the whelp, a devil's name.-

Chaucer — Kneel! Ask grace of this lady here.
Miller [sullenly] — What lady?

Chaucer — Of her whom gentles call St. Charity

In every place and time. —

[Turns then towards Prioress.]

What other name

This lady bears, I have not yet been honored
With knowing. = — Kneel!

Miller [morosely; kneels] — Lady, I axe your pardon.

Chaucer — Madame, your little hound is safe.

Prioress [nestles the little hound with tender effusiveness; then turns shyly
to Chaucer —

Merci!
My name is Madame Eglantine.

[Hurries out, left.]

Chaucer [aside] — Hold, Geoffrey!

Yon beastie's quaking side thumped not as thine
Thumps now. And wilt thou ape a little hound?
Ah, Madame Eglantine, unless ye be
To me, as well as him, St. Charity!

Franklin — Who is the man?

Miller - The Devil, by his eye.

They say King Richard hath to court a wrastler
Can grip ten men. I guess that he be him.

Cook — Ho! milksop of a miller!

Miller [seizing him] — Say it twice;

What?

Cook - Nay, thou art a bull at bucking doors.

Franklin — Let ribs be hoops for twenty gallon ale
And stop your wind-bags. Come.

9494f PERCY MACKAYE

Miller [with a grin, follows the Franklin] —
Ship man — Twelve crown.

By Corpus bones!
Twelve, say you? See my man of law.

Merchant —

Weaver [springs to his feet] —

The throw is mine! •
Dyer — A lie! When we were away

You changed the dice!

Weaver — My throw was cinq and three.

Dyer — A lie! Have it in your gullet!

[Draws his knife. They fight.}

Carpenter — Part them!

Tapicer — Back!

Host — Harrow! Dick Weaver, hold! Fie, Master Dyer,

Here's not a dyeing stablishment; we want
No crimson cloth — Clap hands now: Knave, more ale.

Chaucer [to the Doctor] —

If then, as by hypothesis, this cook

Hath broke his nose, it follpws first that we

Must calculate the ascendent of his image. .

Doctor — Precisely! Pray proceed. I am fortunate

To have met a fellow-doctor at this inn.

Chaucer — Next, treating him by magic natural,
Provide him well with old authorities,
As Esculapius, Diescorides,
Damascien, Constantinus, Averrois,
Hippocrates, Serapion, Razis,
Bernardus, Galienus, Gilbertinus —

Doctor — But, sir, the fellow cannot read —

Chaucer — Why, true;

Then there remains but one sure remedy,
Thus: bid him, fasting, when the moon is wane,
And Venus rises in the house of Pisces,
To rub it nine times with a herring's tail.

Doctor — Yea, Pisces is a fish. — I thank you, sir.

[He hurries of to the Cook, whose nose he has patched.}

Host [to the Reeve, who enters} —

God save thee, Osewold! What's o'clock? Thou looks't

As puckered as a pear at Candlemas.
Reeve — There be too many fold i' the world; and none

Is ripe till he be rotten.

PERCY MACKAYE 9494 g

[Sits at table.]

Penny 'orth ale!

Squire — My lord, father!

Knight — Well, son?

Squire [looking at Chaucer] — Sir, saw you ever

So knightly, sweet, and sovereign a man,
With eyes so glad and shrewdly innocent?
O, when I laid my hand in his, and looked
Into his eyes, meseemed I rode on horse
Into the April open fields, and heard
The larks upsinging in the sun. Sir, have
You guessed who 'tis?

Knight — To judge him by his speech,

Some valiant officer.

Squire — Nay, I have guessed.

THE SCARECROW
Copyright by the Macmillan Co., and reprinted by their permission.

Act IV.

[Night. The moon, shining in broadly at the window, discovers Ravens-
bane alone, prostrate before the mirror. Raised on one arm to a
half-sitting posture, he gazes fixedly at the -vaguely seen image of the
scarecrow prostrate in the glass.]

RAVENSBANE — All have left me — but not thou. Rachel has
left me; her eyes have turned away from me; she is gone.
And with her, the great light itself from heaven has drawn
her glorious skirts, contemptuous, from me — and they are gone
together. Dickon, he too has left me — but not thou. All that I
loved, all that loved me, have left me. A thousand ages — a thousand
ages ago, they went away; and thou and I have gazed upon each other's
desert edness. Speak! and be pitiful! If thou art I, inscrutable
image, if thou dost feel these pangs thine own, show then self -mercy;
speak! What art thou? What am I? Why are we here? How
comes it that we feel and guess and suffer? Nay, though thou answer
not these doubts, yet mock them, mock them aloud, even as there,
monstrous, thou counterfeitest mine actions.- Speak, abject enigma!
— Ah ! with what vacant horror it looks out and yearns toward me.
Peace to thee! Thou poor delirious mute, prisoned in glass and

9494 h PERCY MACKAYE

moonlight, peace! Thou canst not escape thy gaol, nor I break in to
thee. Poor shadow, thou —

[Recoiling wildly.]

Stand back, inanity! Thrust not thy mawkish face in pity toward
me. Ape and idiot ! Scarecrow ! — to console me ! Haha ! -
A flail and broomstick! a cob, a gourd and pumpkin, to fuse and
sublimate themselves into a mage-philosopher, who puffeth meta-
physics from a pipe and discourseth sweet philanthropy to itself —
itself, God! Dost Thou hear? Itself! For even such am I — I
whom Thou madest to love Rachel. Why, God — haha ! dost Thou
dwell in this thing? Is it Thou that peerest forth at me — from me?
Why, hark then; Thou shalt listen, and answer — if Thou canst.
Hark then, Spirit of life! Between the rise and setting of a sun, I
have walked in this world of Thine. I have gazed upon it, I have
peered within it, I have grown enamored, enamored of it. I have
been thrilled with wonder, I have been calmed with knowledge, I
have been exalted with sympathy. I have trembled with joy and
passion. Power, beauty, love have ravished me. Infinity itself,
like a dream, has blazed before me with the certitude of prophecy;
and I have cried, ((This world, the heavens, time itself, are mine to
conquer,)) and I have thrust forth mine arm to wear Thy shield forever
— and lo ! for my shield Thou reachest me a mirror — and whisperest
((Know thyself! Thou art — a scarecrow: a tinkling clod, a rigmarole
of dust, a lump of ordure, contemptible, superfluous, inane!)) Haha!
Hahaha! And with such scarecrows Thou dost people a planet!
O ludicrous! Monstrous! Ludicrous! At least, I thank Thee,
God ! at least, this breathing bathos can laugh at itself. At least this
hotch-potch nobleman of stubble is enough of an epicure to turn his own
gorge. Thou hast vouchsafed to me, Spirit, — hahaha ! — to know my-
self. Mine, mine is the consummation of man — even self -contempt !

[Pointing in the glass with an agony of derision.]

Scarecrow ! Scarecrow ! Scarecrow !

The Image in the Glass [more and more faintly] — Scarecrow !
Scarecrow ! Scarecrow !

[Ravensbane throws himself prone upon the floor, beneath the window,
sobbing. There is a pause of silence, and the moon shines brighter.
Slowly then Ravensbane, getting to his knees, looks out into the
night.}

PERCY MACKAYE 94941

Ravensbane — What face are you, high up through the twinkling
leaves? Why do you smile upon me with such white beneficence?
Or why do you place your viewless hand upon my brow, and say,
«Be comforted))? Do you not, like all the rest, turn, aghast, your
eyes away from me — me, abject enormity, groveling at your feet?
Gracious being, do you not fear — despise me ? To you alone am I
not hateful — unredeemed ? 0 white peace of the world, beneath
your gaze the clouds glow silver, and the herded cattle, slumbering
far afield, crouch — beautiful. The slough shines lustrous as a
bridal veil. Beautiful face, you are Rachel's, and you have changed
the world. Nothing is mean, but you have made it miraculous;
nothing is loathsome, nothing ludicrous, but you have converted it to
loveliness, that even this shadow of a mockery myself, cast by your
light, gives me the dear assurance I am a man. Yea, more, that I
too, steeped in your universal light, am beautiful. For you are
Rachel, and you love me. You are Rachel in the sky, and the might
of your serene loveliness has transformed me. Rachel, mistress,
mother, beautiful spirit, out of my suffering you have brought forth
my soul. I am saved!

The Image in the Glass — A very pretty sophistry.

[The moonlight grows dimmer, as at the passing of a cloud.}

Ravensbane — Ah ! what voice has snatched you from me ?
The Image — A most poetified pumpkin !

Ravensbane — Thing ! dost thou speak at last ? My soul abhors
thee.

The Image — I am thy soul.
Ravensbane — Thou liest.

The Image — Our Daddy Dickon and our mother Rickby begot
and conceived us at sunrise, in a Jack-o'-lantern.

Ravensbane — Thou liest, torturing illusion. Thou art but a
phantom in a glass.

The Image — Why, very true. So art thou. We are a pretty
phantom in a glass.

Ravensbane — It is a lie. I am no longer thou. I feel it ; I am a
man.

The Image — And prithee, -what's a man? Man's but a mirror,
Wherein the imps and angels play charades,
Make faces, mope, and pull each other's hair —
Till crack! the sly urchin Death shivers the glass,
And the bare coffin boards show underneath.

9494J PERCY MACKAYE

Ravensbane — Yea! if it be so, thou coggery ! if both of us be indeed
but illusions, why, now let us end together. But if it be not so, then
let me for evermore be free of thee. Now is the test — the glass !

[Springing to the fireplace, he seizes an iron cross-piece from the andirons.]

I'll play your urchin Death and shatter it. Let's see what shall
survive !

[He rushes to strike the glass with the iron. Dickon steps out of the mirrort
closing the curtain.]

Dickon — I wouldn't really!

Ravensbane — Dickon ! dear Dickon ! is it you ?

Dickon — Yes, Jacky ! it's dear Dickon, and I really wouldn't.

Ravensbane — Wouldn't what, Dickon?

Dickon — Sweep the cobwebs off the sky with thine aspiring
broomstick. When a man questions fate, 'tis bad digestion. When
a scarecrow does it, 'tis bad taste.

Ravensbane — At last, you will tell me the truth, Dickon! Am I
then — that thing?

Dickon — You mustn't be so skeptical. Of course you're that
thing.

Ravensbane — Ah me despicable ! Rachel, why didst thou ever
look upon me?

9495

NORMAN MACLEOD

(i8i2-i872)>

!N THE present century the Scottish Church has given to the
world two sons of pre-eminent importance and influence: Dr.
Chalmers and Dr. Norman Macleod. The names of these
two men, simple clergymen of the simple Scottish Church, are familiar
not only in Scotland and among Scotsmen all the world over, but
among thousands also of English and Americans. With one only we
have to do here: the famous Scottish minister and Queen's Chaplain
who became so universally known and beloved in Scotland that he
was rarely if ever alluded to by his full name, but simply as « Dr. Nor-
man » — and even, in many localities, merely as (< Norman. » Norman
Macleod was a notable man on account of his writings; a still more
notable man on account of his preaching and influence ; possibly more
notable still as an ideal type of the Highlander from the Highland
point of view; and above all, notable for his dominant and striking
personality. It has been said, and perhaps truly, that no one has
taken so strong a hold of the affections of his countrymen since
Burns. Fine as are Dr. Macleod's writings, — notably ( The Reminis-
cences of a Highland Parish,* <The Old Lieutenant,' < The Starling, >
and < Wee Davie, * — we may look there in vain for adequate sources
of this wide-spread and still sustained popularity. Fine as his literary
gifts are, his supreme gift was that of an over-welling human sym-
pathy, by which he made himself loved, from the poorest Highland
crofters or the roughest Glasgow artisans to the Queen herself. This
is fully brought out in the admirable Memoir written by his brother,
Dr. Donald Macleod, the present editor of that well-known magazine,
Good Words, which Dr. Norman began. The name of his childhood
and his family, says Dr. Donald, —

•<was to all Scotland his title, as distinct as a Duke's, — Norman Macleod;
sometimes the < Norman > alone was enough. He was a Scottish minister, noth-
ing more ; incapable of any elevation to rank, bound to mediocrity of means
by the mere fact of his profession, never to be bishop of anywhere, dean
of anywhere, lord of anything, so long as life held him, yet everybody's fel-
low wherever he went: dear brother of the Glasgow workingmen in their
grimy fustians ; of the Ayrshire weavers in their cottages ; dear friend of the
sovereign on the throne. He had great eloquence, great talent, and many of
the characteristics of genius ; but above all, he was the most brotherly of men.
It is doubtful whether his works will live an independent life after him:

949^

NORMAN MACLEOD

rather, perhaps, it may be found that their popularity depended upon him
and not upon them ; and his personal claims must fade, as those who knew him
follow him into the Unknown."

And indeed there could be no better summary of Norman Macleod
than this at once pious and just estimate by his brother.

He came not only of one of the most famous Highland clans, but
of a branch noted throughout the West of Scotland for the stalwart
and ever militant sons of the church which it has contributed from
generation to generation. It is to this perpetuity of vocation, as well
as to the transmission of family names, that a good deal of natural
confusion is due in the instance of writers bearing Highland names,
and of the Macleods in particular. <( They're a' thieves, fishermen, or
ministers, }> as is said in the West; and however much or little truth
there may be in the first, there is a certain obvious truth in the
second, and a still more obvious truth in the third. Again and again
it is stated that Dr. Norman Macleod — meaning this Norman — is the
author of what is now the most famous song among the Highlanders,
the farewell to Fiunary*; a song which has become a Highland
national lament. But this song was really written by Dr. Norman
Macleod the elder; that is, the father of 'the Dr. Norman Macleod of
whom we are now writing.

Norman Macleod was born on June 3d, 1812, in Campbelltown of
Argyll. After his education for the church at Glasgow and Edin-
burgh Universities, he traveled for some time in Germany as private
tutor. Some years after his ordainment to an Ayrshire parish, he
visited Canada on ecclesiastical business. It was not till 1851 that he
was translated to the church with which his name is so closely asso-
ciated; namely, the Barony Charge in Glasgow.' Three years after
this, in 1854, he became one of her Majesty's Chaplains for Scotland,
and Dean of the Order of the Thistle. In 1860 he undertook the
editorship of Good Words; and made this magazine, partly by his
own writings and still more by his catholic and wise editorship, one
of the greatest successes in periodical literature. Long before his
death at the comparatively early age of sixty, he had become famous
as the most eloquent and influential of the Scottish ministry; indeed,
so great was his repute that hundreds of loyal Scots from America
and Australia came yearly to Scotland, primarily with the desire to
see and hear one whom many of them looked to as the most emi-
nent Scot of his day. It was in his shrewdness of judgment, his
swift and kindly tact, his endless fund of humor, and his sweet
human sympathy, that the secret of his immense influence lay. But
while it is by virtue of his personal qualities that even now he sur-
vives in the memory of his countrymen, there is in his writings much
that is distinctive and beautiful. Probably * The Reminiscences of a

NORMAN MACLEOD

9497

Highland Parish > will long be read for their broad and fine sense of
human life in all its ordinary aspects. This book, without any par-
ticular pretensions to style, is full of such kindly insight, such swift
humor, and such broad sympathy, that it is unquestionably the most
characteristic literary work of its author. Probably, among his few
efforts in fiction, the story known as < The Old Lieutenant and his
Son > (unless it be ( The Starling > ) still remains the most popular.
Curiously enough, although his sermons stirred all Scotland, there
are few of them which in perusal at this late date have any specially
moving quality, apart from their earnestness and native spiritual
beauty. There is however one which stands out above the others,
and is to this day familiar to thousands: the splendid sermon on
(War and Judgment, J which, at a crucial moment in the history of
his country, Dr. Norman Macleod preached before the Queen at the
little Highland church of Crathie.

The three extracts which follow adequately represent Dr. Macleod.
The first exemplifies his narrative style. The second depicts those
West Highlands which he loved so well and helped to make others
love. The third is one of those little lyrics in lowland Scottish which
live to this day in the memories of the people.

THE HOME-COMING
From ( The Old Lieutenant and his Son >

THERE lived in the old burgh one of that class termed (< fools w
to whom I have already alluded, who was called "daft
Jock." Jock was lame, walked by the aid of a long staff,
and generally had his head and shoulders covered up with an old
coat. Babby had a peculiar aversion to Jock; why, it was diffi-
cult to discover, as her woman's heart was kindly disposed to all
living things. Her regard was supposed to have been partially
alienated from Jock from his always calling her <(Wee Babbity,}>
accompanying the designation with a loud and joyous laugh.
Now, I have never yet met a human being who was not weak
on a point of personal peculiarity which did not natter them. It
has been said that a woman will bear any amount of abuse that
does not involve a slight upon her appearance. Men are equally
susceptible of similar pain. A very tall or very fat hero will be
calm while his deeds are criticized or his fame disparaged, but
will resent with bitterness any marked allusion to his great longi-
tude or latitude. Babby never could refuse charity to the needy,
and Jock was sure of receiving something from her as the result

949^

NORMAN MACLEOD

of his weekly calls; but he never consigned a scrap of meat to
his wallet without a preliminary battle. On the evening of the
commemoration of the <( Melampus " engagement, Babby was sit-
ting by the fire watching a fowl which twirled from the string
roasting for supper, and which dropped its unctuous lard on a
number of potatoes that lay basking in the tin receiver below.
A loud rap was heard at the back door; and to the question,
(< Who's there ? " the reply was heard of (< Babbity, open ! Open,
wee Babbity ! Hee, hee, hee ! "

(< Gae wa wi' ye, ye daft cratur, " said Babby. <( What right
hae ye to disturb folk at this time o' nicht ? I'll let loose the
dog on you."

Babby knew that Skye shared her dislike to Jock; as was
evident from his bark when he rose, and with curled tail began
snuffing at the foot of the door. Another knock, louder than
before, made Babby start.

<( My word," she exclaimed, (<but ye hae learned impudence ! "
And afraid of disturbing <(the company," she opened as much of
the door as enabled her to see and rebuke Jock. <( Hoo daur ye,
Jock, to rap sae loud as that ? "

<( Open, wee, wee, wee Babbity ! " said Jock.

<(Ye big, big, big blackguard, I'll dae naething o' the kind,"
said Babby as she shut the door. But the stick of the fool was
suddenly interposed. <( That beats a' ! " said Babby : (< what the
sorrow d'ye want, Jock, to daur to presume — "

But to Babby's horror the door was forced open in the mid-
dle of her threat, and the fool entered, exclaiming, <( I want a
kiss, my wee, wee, bonnie Babbity ! "

<( Preserve us a' ! " exclaimed Babby, questioning whether she
should scream or fly, while the fool, turning his back to the
light, seized her by both her wrists, and imprinted a kiss on her
forehead.

"Skye!" half screamed Babby; but Skye was springing up,
as if anxious to kiss Jock. Babby fell back on a chair, and
catching a glimpse of the fool's face, she exclaimed, <(O my
darling, my darling ! O Neddy, Neddy, Neddy ! " Flinging off
her cap, as che always did on occasions of great perplexity, she
seized him by the hands, and then sunk back, almost fainting, in
the chair.

<( Silence, dear Babby!" said Ned, speaking in a whisper; "for
I want to astonish the old couple. How glad I aw to see yon[

NORMAN MACLEOD

and they are all well, I know; and Freeman here, too!" Then
seizing the dog, he clasped him to his heart, while the brute
struggled with many an eager cry to kiss his old master's face.

Ned's impulse from the first was to rush into the parlor; but
he was restrained by that strange desire which all have experi-
enced in the immediate anticipation of some great joy, — to hold
it from us, as a parent does a child, before we seize it and clasp
it to our breast.

The small party, consisting of the captain, his wife, and Free-
.man, were sitting round the parlor fire; Mrs. Fleming sewing,
and the others keeping up rather a dull conversation, as those
who felt, though they did not acknowledge, the presence of some-
thing at their hearts which hindered their usual freedom and
genial hilarity.

<( Supper should be ready by this time," suggested the captain,
just as the scene between Ned and Babby was taking place in
the kitchen. (< Babby and Skye seem busy: I shall ring, may I
not ? "

<( If you please," said Mrs. Fleming; (( but depend upon it,
Babby will cause no unnecessary delays. *

Babby speedily responded to the captain's ring. On entering
the room she burst into a fit of laughing. Mrs. Fleming put
down her work and looked at her servant as if she was mad.

<( What do you mean, woman ? " asked the captain with knit
brows: (< I never saw you behave so before."

« Maybe no. Ha! ha! ha!" said Babby; « but there's a queer
man wishing to speak wi' ye." At this moment a violent ring
was heard from the door-bell.

<(A queer man — wishing to speak with me — at this hour,"
muttered the captain, as if in utter perplexity.

Babby had retired to the lobby, and was ensconced, with her
apron in her mouth, in a corner near the kitchen. <(You had
better open the door yersel'," cried Babby, smothering her laugh-
ter.

The captain, more puzzled than ever, went to the door, and
opening it was saluted with a gruff voice, saying, « I'm a poor
sailor, sir, — and knows you're an old salt, — and have come to
see you, sir."

(< See me, sir ! What do you want ? " replied the captain
gruffly, as one whose kindness some impostor hoped to bene-
fit by.

9500 NORMAN MACLEOD

(< Wants nothing, sir, * said the sailor, stepping near the captain.

A half -scream, half-laugh from Babby drew Mrs. Fleming and
Freeman to the lobby.

((You want nothing? What brings you to disturb me at this
hour of the night ? Keep back, sir ! "

<(Well, sir, seeing as how I sailed with Old Cairney, I thought
you would not refuse me a favor, " replied the sailor in a hoarse
voice.

"Don't dare, sir," said the captain, (<to come into my house
one step farther, till I know more about you."

<( Now, captain, don't be angry; you know as how that great
man Nelson expected every man to do his duty: all I want is
just to shake Mrs. Fleming by the hand, and then I go; that is,
if after that you want me for to go."

(< Mrs. Fleming ! " exclaimed the captain, with the indignation
of a man who feels that the time has come for open war as
against a house-breaker. (< If you dare — "

But Mrs. Fleming, seeing the rising storm, passed her husband
rapidly, and said to the supposed intruder, whom she assumed to
be a tipsy sailor, <( There is my hand, if that's all you want: go
away now as you said, and don't breed any disturbance."

But the sailor threw his arms around his mother, and Babby
rushed forward with a light; and then followed muffled cries
of « Mother!" « Father!" <(Ned!» «My own boy!" «God be
praised ! " until the lobby was emptied, and the parlor once more
alive with as joyous and thankful hearts as ever met in (< hamlet
or in baron's ha'!"

HIGHLAND SCENERY

HER great delight was in the scenery of that West Highland
country. Italy has its gorgeous beauty, and is a magnifi-
cent volume of poetry history, and art, superb within and
without, read by the light of golden sunsets. Switzerland is the
most perfect combination of beauty and grandeur; from its up-
lands— with grass more green and closely shaven than an English
park; umbrageous with orchards; musical with rivulets; tinkling
with the bells of wandering cattle and flocks of goats; social with
picturesque villages gathered round the chapel spires — up to the
bare rocks and mighty cataracts of ice; until the eye rests on the

NOR1N

95°*

,rp in the intense blue of
<wn the whole marvelous picture with
Torway its peculiar glory of fiords

ling their v tmong gigantic mount-

lofty precipices, or primeval forests. But the scenery of the
:.ern Highlands -ctive character of its own. It is

not beauty, in spit- ;h and oak copse that

e the : lochs and the innumerable bights and bays

of pearly sand. Nor is it grandeur — although there is a wonder-
ful i tr-stretching landscapes of ocean meeting the
on, or of h ridges, mingling afar
upper sky. But coloring of its mount-
ains; in the silence of its untrodden valleys; in the extent of its

A undulating moors; in the sweep of its rocky corr:
in the shifting mists and clouds that hang over its dark preci-
: in all this kind of s ith the wild tradii

which ghost-like float around he

MONGOLIAN BUDDHISTIC WRITING

" tO the im; Facsimile of part of fragment of a Mongolian manuscript of the XVIth
century. It was discovered by the Russians in the ruins of the

Buddhist monastery of Ablai-Kied, a desert spot near
from the rest -Of tfle s<>urce of the river Irtiscu.

rocky fastnesses, before they (< a their dun

wings from Morven."

MY LITTLE MAY

MY LITTLE May was like a lintie
Glintin' 'mang the flowers o* spring;
Like a lintie she was cantie,

Like a lintie she could sing; —
Singing, milking in the gloamin',
Singing, herding in the morn,
Singing 'mang the brackens roaming,
Singing shearing yellow corn !
Oh the bonnie dell and dingle,

Oh the bor: -,f glen,

Oh the bonnie bleezin' ingle,
Oh the bonnie but and ben!

Ilka body smiled that met her,

Nane were, glad 1 f areweel ; "

dJlVX adjno JqhDaunsavnBifognoM

NORMAN MACLEOD

peaks of alabaster snow, clear and sharp in the intense blue of
the cloudless sky, which crown the whole marvelous picture with
awful grandeur! Norway too has its peculiar glory of fiords
worming their way like black water-snakes among gigantic mount-
ains, lofty precipices, or primeval forests. But the scenery of the
Western Highlands has a distinctive character of its own. It is
not beauty, in spite of its knolls of birch and oak copse that
fringe the mountain lochs and the innumerable bights and bays
of pearly sand. Nor is it grandeur — although there is a wonder-
ful vastness in its far-stretching landscapes of ocean meeting the
horizon, or of hills beyond hills, in endless ridges, mingling afar
with the upper sky. But in the sombre coloring of its mount-
ains; in the silence of its untrodden valleys; in the extent of its
bleak and undulating moors; in the sweep of its rocky corries;
in the shifting mists and clouds that hang over its dark preci-
pices: in all this kind of scenery, along with the wild traditions
which ghost-like float around its ancient keeps, and live in the
tales of its inhabitants, there is a glory and a sadness, most affect-
ing to the imagination, and suggestive of a period of romance
and song, of clanships and of feudal attachments, which, banished
from the rest of Europe, took refuge and lingered long in those
rocky fastnesses, before they (< passed away forever on their dun
wings from Morven."

MY LITTLE MAY

MY LITTLE May was like a lintie
Glintin' 'mang the flowers o* spring;
Like a lintie she was cantie,

Like a lintie she could sing; —
Singing, milking in the gloamin',
Singing, herding in the morn,
Singing 'mang the brackens roaming,
Singing shearing yellow corn!
Oh the bonnie dell and dingle,

Oh the bonnie flowering glen,
Oh the bonnie bleezin' ingle,
Oh the bonnie but and ben!

Ilka body smiled that met her,

Nane were glad that said fareweel;

NORMAN MACLEOD

Never was a blyther, better,

Bonnier bairn, frae croon to heel!
Oh the bonnie dell and dingle,

Oh the bonnie flowering glen,
Oh the bonnie bleezin' ingle,
Oh the bonnie but and ben!

Blaw, wintry winds, blaw cauld and eerie,

Drive the .sleet and drift the snaw;
May is sleeping, she was weary,
For her heart was broke in twa!
Oh wae the dell and dingle,

Oh wae the flowering glen;
Oh wae aboot the ingle,

Wae's me baith but and ben!

95°3

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

IHE change in aim and method of the modern historian has
kept pace with the development of the democratic idea.
Where before, in the study and writing of history, the do-
ings of rulers and courts and the working of governmental machinery
have been the chief points of interest, to the exclusion of the every-
day deeds and needs of the nation, the tendency to-day is to lay
emphasis on the life of the people broadly viewed, — the development
of the social organism in all its parts. The feeling behind this
tendency is based on a conviction that the
true vitality of a country depends upon the
healthy growth and general welfare of the
great mass of plain folk, — the working,
struggling, wealth-producing people who
make it up. The modern historian, in a
word, makes man in the State, irrespective
of class or position, his subject for sympa-
thetic portrayal.

This type of historian is represented by
John Bach McMaster, whose < History of
the People of the United States J strives to
give a picture of social rather than consti-
tutional and political growth: those phases JOHN BACH McMASTER
of American history have been treated ably

by Adams, Schouler, and others. Professor McMaster, with admirable
lucidity and simplicity of style, and always with an appeal to fact
precluding the danger of the subjective writing of history to fit a
theory, tells this vital story of the national evolution, and tells it as
it has not been told before. The very title of his work defines its
purpose. It is a history not of the United States, but of the people
of the United States, — like Green's great ( History of the English
People,' another work having the same ideal, the modern attitude.
The period covered in Professor McMaster's plan is that reaching
from the adoption of the Constitution in 1789 to the outbreak of the
Civil War, — less than one hundred years, but a crucial time for
the shaping of the country. The depiction of the formative time,
the day of the pioneer and the settler, — of the crude beginnings of

9504 JOHN BACH MCMASTER

civilization, — engages his particular attention and receives his most
careful treatment. An example is given in the selection chosen from
his work, which gains warmth and picturesqueness in this way. The
first volume of his work appeared in 1883; the sixth in 1908. It pro-
vides an invaluable storehouse of information on the life and manners
of our growing nation. Professor McMaster has allowed himself
space and leisure in order to make an exhaustive survey of the field,
and a synthetic presentation of the material. His history when fin-
ished will be of very great value. His preparation for it began in
1870, when he was a young student, and it will be his life work and
monument.

John Bach McMaster was born in Brooklyn, June 29th, 1852; and
received his education at the College of the City of New York, his
graduation year being 1872. He taught a little, studied civil engi-
neering, and in 1877 became instructor in that branch at Princeton.
Thence he was called in 1883 to the University of Pennsylvania, to
take the chair of American history, which he still holds. Professor
McMaster is also an attractive essayist. His 'Benjamin Franklin as
a Man of Letters' (1887) is an excellent piece of biography; and
the volume of papers called 'With the Fathers > (1896) contains a
series of historical portraits sound in scholarship and very readable
in manner. In his insistence on the presenting of the unadorned
truth, his dislike of pseudo-hero worship, Professor McMaster seems at
times iconoclastic. But while he is not entirely free from prejudice,
his intention is to give no false lights to the picture, and few his-
torians have been broader minded and fairer.

TOWN AND COUNTRY LIFE IN 1800

From <A History of the People of the United States from the Revolution to
the Civil War.> D. Appleton & Co., 1885. Copyright 1885, by John Bach
McMaster.

WHAT was then known as the far West was Kentucky, Ohio,
and central New York. Into it the emigrants came
streaming along either of two routes. Men from New
England took the most northern, and went out by Albany and
Troy to the great wilderness which lay along the Mohawk and
the lakes. They came by tens of thousands from farms and vil-
lages, and represented every trade, every occupation, every walk
in life, save one: none were seafarers. No whaler left his vessel;
no seaman deserted his mess; no fisherman of Marblehead or
Gloucester exchanged the dangers of a life on the ocean for the

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

privations of a life in the West. Their fathers and their uncles
had been fishermen before them, and their sons were to follow
in their steps. Long before a lad could nib a quill, or make a
pot-hook, or read half the precepts his primer contained, he knew
the name of every brace and stay, every sail and part of a Grand
Banker and a Chebacco, all the nautical terms, what line and
hook should be used for catching halibut and what for mackerel
and cod. If he ever learned to write, he did so at (< writing-
school, }) which, like singing-school, was held at night, and to
which he came bringing his own dipped candle, his own paper,
and his own pen. The candlestick was a scooped-out turnip, or
a piece of board with a nail driven through it. His paper he
ruled with a piece of lead, for the graphite lead-pencil was un-
known. All he knew of theology, and much of his knowledge of
reading and spelling, was gained with the help of the New Eng-
land Primer. There is not, and there never was, a text-book so
richly deserving a history as the Primer. The earliest mention
of it in print now known is to be found in an almanac for the
year 1691. The public are there informed that a second impres-
sion is (<in press, and will suddenly be extant w; and will con-
tain, among much else that is new, the verses John Rogers the
Martyr made and left as a legacy to his children. When the
second impression became extant, a rude cut of Rogers lashed to
the stake, and while the flames burned fiercely, discoursing to his
wife and nine small children, embellished the verses, as it has
done in every one of the innumerable editions since struck off.
The tone of the Primer is deeply religious. Two thirds of . the
four-and-twenty pictures placed before the couplets and triplets
in rhyme, from

«In Adam's fall
We sinned all,*
to

<(Zaccheus, he

Did climb a tree
Our Lord to see,**

represent Biblical incidents. Twelve <( words of six syllables >J are
given in the spelling lesson. Five of them are — abomination, edi-
fication, humiliation, mortification, purification. More than half
the book is made up of the Lord's Prayer and the Creed, some
of Watts's hymns, and the whole of that great Catechism which
one hundred and twenty divines spent five years in preparing.

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

There too are Mr. Rogers's verses, and John Cotton's ( Spiritual
Milk for American Babes*; exhortations not to cheat at play,
not to lie, not to use ill words, not to call ill names, not to be a
dunce, and to love school. The Primer ends with the famous
dialogue between Christ, Youth, and the Devil.

Moved by pity and a wish to make smooth the rough path to
learning, some kind soul prepared <A Lottery-Book for Children.1
The only difficulty in teaching children to read was, he thought,
the difficulty of keeping their minds from roaming; and to (<pre^
vent this precipitancy }> was the object of the ( Lottery-Book. } On
one side of each leaf was a letter of the alphabet; on the other
two pictures. As soon, he explained, as the child could speak, it
should thrust a pin through the leaf from the side whereon the
pictures were, at the letter on the other, and should continue to
do this till at last the letter was pierced. Turning the leaf after
each trial, the mind of the child would be fixed so often and so
long on the letter that it would ever after be remembered.

. The illustrations in the book are beneath those of a patent-
medicine almanac, but are quite as good as any that can be found
in children's books of that day. No child had then ever seen
such specimens of the wood-engraver's and the printer's and the
binder's arts as now, at the approach of every Christmas, issue
from hundreds of presses. The covers of such chap-books were
bits of wood, and the backs coarse leather. On the covers was
sometimes a common blue paper, and sometimes a hideous wall-
paper, adorned with horses and dogs, roosters and eagles, standing
in marvelous attitudes on gilt or copper scrolls. The letterpress
of none was specially illustrated, but the same cut was used
again and again to express the most opposite ideas. A woman
with a dog holding her train is now Vanity, and now Miss All-
worthy going abroad to buy books for her brother and sister.
A huge vessel with three masts is now a yacht, and now the
ship in which Robinson Crusoe sailed from Hull. The virtuous
woman that is a crown to her husband, and naughty Miss Kitty
Bland, are one and 'the same. Master Friendly listening to the
minister at church now heads a catechism, and now figures as
Tommy Careless in the (Adventures of a Week.* A man and
woman feeding beggars become, in time, transformed into a
servant introducing two misers to his mistress. But no creature
played so many parts as a bird, which after being named an
eagle, a cuckoo, and a kite, is called finally Noah's dove.

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

Mean and cheap as such chap-books were, the peddler who
hawked them sold not one to the good wives of a fishing village.
The women had not the money to buy with; the boys had not
the disposition to read. Till he was nine, a lad did little more
than watch the men pitch pennies in the road, listen to sea
stories, and hurry, at the cry of (( Rock him," <( Squail him," to
help his playmates pelt with stones some unoffending boy from a
neighboring village. By the time he had seen his tenth birth-
day he was old enough not to be seasick, not to cry during a
storm at sea, and to be of some use about a ship; and went on
his first trip to the Banks. The skipper and the crew called him
'( cut-tail " ; for he received no money save for the fish he caught,
and each one he caught was marked by snipping a piece from
the tail. After an apprenticeship of three or four years the
r< cut-tail" became a <( header," stood upon the same footing as
the <(sharesmen," and learned all the duties which a <( splitter"
and a (<salter" must perform. A crew numbered eight; four were
"sharesmen" and four were apprentices; went twice a year to
the Banks, and stayed each time from three to five months.

Men who had passed through such a training were under no
temptation to travel westward. They took no interest, they bore
no part in the great exodus. They still continued to make their
trips and bring home their <( fares"; while hosts of New-England-
ers poured into New York, opening the valleys, founding cities,
and turning struggling hamlets into villages of no mean kind.
Catskill, in 1792, numbered ten dwellings and owned one vessel
of sixty tons. In 1800 there were in the place one hundred
and fifty-six houses, two ships, a schooner, and eight sloops of
one hundred tons each, all owned there and employed in carry-
ing produce to New York. Six hundred and twenty-four bushels
of wheat were brought to the Catskill market in 1792. Forty-
six thousand one hundred and sixty-four bushels came in 1800.
On a single day in 1801 the merchants bought four thousand
one hundred and eight bushels of wheat, and the same day
eight hundred loaded sleighs came into the village by the west-
ern road. In 1790 a fringe of clearings ran along the western
shore of Lake Champlain to the northern border, and pushed
out through the broad valley between the Adirondacks and the
Catskills to Seneca and Cayuga Lakes. In 1800 the Adirondack
region was wholly surrounded. The emigrants had passed Oneida
Lake, had passed Oswego, and skirting the shores of Ontario

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

and the banks of the St. Lawrence, had joined with those on
Lake Champlain. Some had gone down the valleys of the
Delaware and Siisquehanna to the southern border of the State.
The front of emigration was far beyond Elmira and Bath. Just
before it went the speculators, the land-jobbers, the men afflicted
with what in derision was called <( terraphobia. }> They formed
companies and bought millions of acres. They went singly and
purchased whole townships as fast as the surveyors could locate;
buying on trust and selling for wheat, for lumber, for whatever
the land could yield or the settler give. Nor was the pioneer
less infatuated. An irresistible longing drove him westward, and
still westward, till some Indian scalped him, or till hunger, want,
bad food, and exposure broke him down, and the dreaded Genesee
fever swept him away. The moment such a man had built a
log cabin, cleared an acre, girdled the trees, and sowed a hand-
ful of grain, he was impatient to be once more moving. He had
no peace till his little farm was sold, and he had plunged into
the forest to seek a new and temporary home. The purchaser
in time would make a few improvements, clear a few more acres,
plant a little more grain, and then in turn sell and hurry west-
ward. After him came the founders of villages and towns, who,
when the cabins about them numbered ten, felt crowded and
likewise moved away. Travelers through the Genesee valley tell
us they could find no man who had not in this way changed
his abode at least six times. The hardships which these people
endured is beyond description. Their poverty was extreme.
Nothing was so scarce as food; many a wayfarer was turned
from their doors with the solemn assurance that they had not
enough for themselves. The only window in many a cabin was
a hole in the roof for the smoke to pass through. In the win-
ter the snow beat through the chinks and sifted under the door,
till it was heaped up about the sleepers on the floor before the
fire. . . .

Beyond the Blue Ridge everything was most primitive. Half
the roads were <( traces }> and blazed. More than half the houses,
even in the settlements, were log cabins. When a stranger came
to such a place to stay, the men built him a cabin and made
the building an occasion for sport. The trees felled, four corner-
men were elected to notch the logs; and while they were busy
the others ran races, wrestled, played leap-frog, kicked the hat,
fought, gouged, gambled, drank, did everything then considered

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

an amusement. After the notching was finished the raising took
but a few hours. Many a time the cabin was built, roofed, the
door and window cut out, and the owner moved in, before sun-
down. The chinks were stopped with chips and smeared with
mud. The chimney was of logs, coated with mud six inches
thick. The table and the benches, the bedstead and the door,
were such as could be made with an axe, an auger, and a saw.
A rest for the rifle and some pegs for clothes completed the
fittings.

The clothing of a man was in summer a wool hat, a blue
linsey hunting-shirt with a cape, a belt with a gayly colored
fringe, deerskin or linsey pantaloons, and moccasins and shoe-
packs of tanned leather. Fur hats were not common. A boot
was rarely to be seen. In winter, a striped linsey vest and a
white blanket coat were added. If the coat had buttons — and it
seldom had — they were made by covering slices of a cork with
bits of blanket. Food which he did not obtain by his rifle and
his traps he purchased by barter. Corn was the staple; and no
mills being near, it was pounded between two stones or rubbed
on a grater. Pork cost him twelve cents a pound, and salt
four. Dry fish was a luxury, and brought twenty cents a pound.
Sugar was often as high as forty. When he went to a settle-
ment he spent his time at the billiard-table, or in the <( keg
grocery J> playing Loo or (< Finger in Danger, w to determine who
should pay for the whisky consumed. Pious men were terrified
at the drunkenness, the vice, the gambling, the brutal fights,
the gouging, the needless duels they beheld on every hand.
Already the Kentucky boatmen had become more dreaded than
the Indians. <(A Kentuc0 in 1800 had much the same meaning
that (< a cowboy w has now. He was the most reckless, fearless,
law-despising of men. A common description of him was half
horse, half alligator, tipped with snapping-turtle.

On a sudden this community, which the preachers had often
called Satan's stronghold, underwent a moral awakening such as
this world had never beheld.

Two young men began the great work in the summer of 1799.
They were brothers, preachers, and on their way across the
pine barrens to Ohio, but turned aside to be present at a sacra-
mental solemnity on Red River. The people were accustomed
to gather at such times on a Friday, and by praying, singing,
and hearing sermons, prepare themselves for the reception of the

95IO JOHN BACH MCMASTER

sacrament on Sunday. At the Red River meeting the brothers
were asked to preach, and one did so with astonishing fervor.
As he spoke, the people were deeply moved; tears ran streaming
down their faces, and one, a woman far in the rear of the house,
broke through order and began to shout. For two hours after
the regular preachers had gone, the crowd lingered and were
loath to depart. While they tarried, one of the brothers was
irresistibly impelled to speak. He rose and told them that he
felt called to preach, that he could not be silent. The words
which then fell from his lips roused the people before him <( to a
pungent sense of sin.'0 Again and again the woman shouted,
and would not be silent. He started to go to her. The crowd
begged him to turn back. Something within him urged him on,
and he went through the house shouting and exhorting and
praising God. In a moment the floor, to use his own words,
(<was covered with the slain. " Their cries for mercy were
terrible to hear. Some found forgiveness, but many went away
(< spiritually wounded )J and suffering unutterable agony of soul.
Nothing could allay the excitement. Every settlement along the
Green River and the Cumberland was full of religious fervor.
Men fitted their wagons with beds and provisions, and traveled
fifty miles to camp upon the ground and hear him preach.
The idea was new; hundreds adopted it, and camp-meetings
began. There was now no longer any excuse to stay away
from preaching. Neither distance, nor lack of houses, nor scar-
city of food, nor daily occupations prevailed. Led by curiosity,
by excitement, by religious zeal, families of every Protestant
denomination — Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians
— hurried to the camp-ground. Crops were left half gathered;
every kind of work was left undone; cabins were deserted; in
large settlements there did not remain one soul. The first
regular general camp-meeting was held at the Gasper River
Church, in July, 1800; but the rage spread, and a dozen encamp-
ments followed in quick succession. Camp-meeting was always
in the forest near some little church, which served as the preach-
ers' lodge. At one end of a clearing was a rude stage, and
before it the stumps and trunks of hewn trees, on which the
listeners sat. About the clearing were the tents and wagons
ranged in rows like streets. The praying, the preaching, the
exhorting would sometimes last for seven days, and be prolonged
every day until darkness had begun to give way to light. Nor

JOHN BACH MCM ASTER 95II

were the ministers the only exhorters. Men and women, nay,
even children took part. At Cane Ridge a little girl of seven
sat upon the shoulder of a man and preached to the multitude
till she sank exhausted on her bearer's head. At Indian Creek a
lad of twelve mounted a stump and exhorted till he grew weak,
whereupon two men upheld him, and he continued till speech
was impossible. A score of sinners fell prostrate before him.

At no time was the (< falling exercise }> so prevalent as at night.
Nothing was then wanting that could strike terror into minds
weak, timid, and harassed. The red glare of the camp-fires re-
flected from hundreds of tents and wagons; the dense blackness
of the flickering shadows, the darkness of the surrounding forest,
made still more terrible by the groans and screams of the <( spir-
itually wounded, }> who had fled to it for comfort; the entreaty
of the preachers; the sobs and shrieks of the downcast still walk-
ing through the dark valley of the Shadow of Death; the shouts
and songs of praise from the happy ones who had crossed the
Delectable Mountains, had^gone on through the fogs of the En-
chanted Ground, and entered the land of Beulah, were too much
for those over whose minds and bodies lively imaginations held
full sway. The heart swelled, the nerves gave way, the hands
and feet grew cold, and motionless and speechless they fell head-
long to the ground. In a moment crowds gathered about them
to pray and shout. Some lay still as death. Some passed
through frightful twitchings of face and limb. At Cabin Creek
so many fell, that lest the multitude should tread on them, they
were carried to the meeting-house and laid in rows on the floor.
At Cane Ridge the number was three thousand.

The recollection of that famous meeting is still preserved in
Kentucky, where, not many years since, old men could be found
whose mothers had carried them to the camp-ground as infants,
and had left them at the roots of trees and behind logs while
the preaching and exhorting continued. Cane Ridge meeting-
house stood on a well-shaded, well-watered spot, seven miles from
the town of Paris. There a great space had been cleared, a
preacher's stand put up, and a huge tent stretched to shelter the
crowd from the sun and rain. But it did not cover the twen-
tieth part of the people who came. Every road that led to the
ground is described to have presented for several days an almost
unbroken line of wagons, horses, and men. One who saw the
meeting when it had just begun wrote home to Philadelphia that

JOHN BACH McM ASTER

wagons covered an area as large as that between Market Street
and Chestnut, Second and Third. Another, who counted them,
declared they numbered eleven hundred and forty-five. Seven
hundred and fifty lead tokens, stamped with the letters A or B,
were given by the Baptists to communicants; and there were still
upward of four hundred who received none. Old soldiers who
were present, and claimed to know something of the art of esti-
mating the numbers of masses of men, put down those encamped
at the Cane Ridge meeting as twenty thousand souls. The ex-
citement surpassed anything that had been known. Men who
came to scoff remained to preach. All day and all night the
crowd swarmed to and fro from preacher to preacher, singing,
shouting, laughing, now rushing off to listen to some new ex-
horter who had climbed upon a stump, now gathering around
some unfortunate, who in their peculiar language was <( spiritu-
ally slain. w Soon men and women fell in such numbers that it
became impossible for the multitude to move about without
trampling them, and they were hurried to the meeting-house.
At no time was the floor less than half covered. Some lay quiet,
unable to move or speak. Some talked but could not move.
Some beat the floor with their heels. Some, shrieking in agony,
bounded about, it is said, like a live fish out of water. Many
lay down and rolled over and over for hours at a time. Others
rushed wildly over the stumps and benches, and then plunged,
shouting (< Lost ! Lost ! w into the forest.

As the meetings grew more and more frequent, this nervous
excitement assumed new and more terrible forms. One was
known as jerking; another, as the barking exercise; a third, as
the Holy Laugh. <(The jerks* began in the head and spread
rapidly to the feet. The head would be thrown from side to side
so swiftly that the features would be blotted out and the hair
made to snap. When the body was affected, the sufferer was
hurled over hindrances that came in his way, and finally dashed
on the ground to bounce about like a ball. At camp-meetings in
the far South, saplings were cut off breast-high and left <(for the
people to jerk by." One who visited such a camp-ground declares
that about the roots of from fifty to one hundred saplings the
earth was kicked up (< as by a horse stamping flies. >} There only
the lukewarm, the lazy, the half-hearted, the indolent professor
was afflicted. Pious men, and scoffing physicians who sought to
get the jerks that they might speculate upon them, were not

JOHN BACH MCMASTER

touched. But the scoffer did not always escape. Not a professor
of religion within the region of the great revival but had heard
or could tell of some great conversion by special act of God.
One disbeliever, it was reported, while cursing and swearing, had
been crushed by a tree falling on him at the Cane Ridge meet-
ing. Another was said to have mounted his horse to ride away,
when the jerks seized him, pulled his feet from the stirrups,
and flung him on the ground, whence he rose a Christian man.
A lad who feigned sickness, kept from church, and lay abed, was
dragged out and dashed against the wall till he betook himself
to prayer. When peace was restored to him, he passed out into
his father's tan-yard to unhair a hide. Instantly the knife left his
hand, and he was drawn over logs and hurled against trees and
fences till he began to pray in serious earnest. A foolish woman
who went to see the jerks was herself soon rolling in the mud.
Scores of such stories passed from mouth to mouth, and may now
be read in the lives and narratives of the preachers. The com-
munity seemed demented. From the nerves and muscles the dis-
order passed to the mind. Men dreamed dreams and saw visions,
nay, fancied themselves dogs, went down on all fours, and barked
till they grew hoarse. It was no uncommon sight to behold
numbers of them gathered about a tree, barking, yelping, ft treeing
the Devil." Two years later, when much of the excitement of the
great revival had gone down, falling and jerking gave way to
hysterics. During the most earnest preaching and exhorting,
even sincere professors of religion would on a sudden burst into
loud laughter; others, unable to resist, would follow, and soon the
assembled multitude would join in. This was the <( Holy Laugh, })
and became, after 1803, a recognized part of worship.

EFFECTS OF THE EMBARGO OF 1807

From a < History of the People of the United 'States from the Revolution to
the Civil War.> D. Appleton & Co., 1885. Copyright 1885, by John Bach
McMaster./

PARALYSIS seized on the business of the coast towns and began
to spread inward. Ships were dismantled and left half
loaded at the wharves. Crews were discharged. The sound
of the caulking-hammer was no longer heard in the ship-yards.
The sail-lofts were deserted, the rope-walks were closed; the

95 r 4 JOHN BACH MCMASTER

cartmen had nothing to do. In a twinkling- the price of every
domestic commodity went down, and the price of every foreign
commodity went up. But no wages were earned, no business
was done,^ and money almost ceased to circulate. . . .

The federal revenues fell from sixteen millions to a few
thousands. . . . The value of the shipping embargoed has
been estimated at fifty millions; and as the net earnings were
twenty-five per cent., twelve and a half millions more were
lost to the country through the enforced idleness of the vessels.
From an estimate made at the time, it appears that one hundred
thousand men were believed to have been out of work for one
year. They earned from forty cents to one dollar and thirty-
three cents per day. Assuming a dollar as the average rate of
daily wages, the loss to the laboring class was in round numbers
thirty-six millions of dollars. On an average, thirty millions had
been invested annually in the purchase of foreign and domestic
produce. As this great sum was now seeking investment which
could, not be found, its owners were deprived not only of their
profits, but of two millions of interest besides.

Unable to bear the strain, thousands on thousands went to
the wall. The newspapers were full of insolvent-debtor notices.
All over the country the court-house doors, the tavern doors,
the post-offices, the cross-road posts, were covered with advertise-
ments of sheriffs' sales. In the cities the jails were not large
enough to hold the debtors. At New York during 1809 thirteen
hundred men were imprisoned for no other crime than being
ruined by the embargo. A traveler who saw the city in this
day of distress assures us that it looked like a town ravaged by
pestilence. The counting-houses were shut or advertised to let.
The coffee-houses were almost empty. The streets along the
water-side were almost deserted. The ships were dismantled;
their decks were cleared, their hatches were battened down/ Not
a box, not a cask, not a barrel, not a bale was to be seen on
the wharves, where the grass had begun to grow luxuriantly. A
year later, in this same city, eleven hundred and fifty men were
confined for debts under twenty-five dollars, and were clothed by
the Humane Society.

ANDREW MACPHAIL

(1864-)

BY ARCHIBALD MACMECHAN

IHE tiny province of Prince Edward Island is noted for the
pastoral beauty of its landscape and well deserves its by-name,
the Garden of the Gulf. Here, in the Highland settlement
of Orwell, a rich farming district, Andrew Macphail was born on Novem-
ber 24th, 1864. His father, William Macphail (who had been ship-
wrecked on the voyage out from Scotland and had lost all he possessed
except his copy of (Horace)) was first a farmer-schoolmaster at Orwell,
afterwards inspector or ((visitor)) of schools, and ultimately superinten-
dent of the provincial asylum for the insane.

Andrew Macphail attended Prince of Wales College in Charlotte-
town, the chief educational institution of the province, and in 1883
became principal of the Fanning Gramma School, a post he held for
two years. In 1885 he began his studies at McGill University, supple-
menting his means by writing for various local papers and by acting
as tutor, and was graduated in both arts and medicine within six
years. He then went to London to continue his medical studies after
graduation. He also visited the East in the interests of a newspaper
syndicate.

In 1893, he married Georgina Burland, a lady of rare endowments,
who died in 1902, leaving a son and a daughter.

Up to the outbreak of the Great War Macphail practised medicine
in Montreal, spending his summers on the paternal acres at Orwell,
engaged in his favorite recreation of farming. He was Professor of
Pathology in the University of Bishop's College, Lennoxville, Patholo-
gist to the Western Hospital, and to Verdun Hospital for the Insane,
and Professor of the History of Medicine in McGill University. In
1915, as a captain in No. 6 Field Ambulance of the Canadian Expedi-
tionary Force, he followed his brother Alexander and his son Jeffrey
overseas. He obtained the post, he said, not on account of his medical
knowledge, but because, forty years before, he had learned to ride a horse.

Macphail's literary work is notable for its variety. Countless
articles, a novel, some verse, an unpublished play, three volumes of
essays, stand to the credit of his untiring pen. He has managed two
important publications with conspicuous success, The Canadian Medical
Journal and The University Magazine. During the war, he has found
time to complete and see through the press his remarkable anthology,
(The Book of Sorrow.) He has assisted generously in other literary

95l4b ANDREW MACPHAIL

undertakings such as the publication of Miss Marjorie Pickthall's
exquisite poems.

His first book, (Essays in Puritanism) (1905), consists of five
critical studies of such diverse personalities as Jonathan Edwards, who
manifested the spirit of Puritanism in the pulpit, John Winthrop, who
showed that spirit at work in the world, Margaret Fuller, who reacted
against that spirit in one way, and Walt Whitman, who rebelled against
it in another. The fifth essay is a sympathetic appreciation of the
character and work of John Wesley. The essays were prepared first
for the Pen and Pencil Club of Montreal. They set all the five charac-
ters studied in a new light. The style is masculine and distinguished
by quiet irony, caustic wit, and incisive vigor of phrase.

With the by-products, apparently, of the research involved in these
studies, he constructed his second book, (The Vine of Sibmah) (1906).
This is an historical romance of Puritan New England shortly after the
Restoration. It recounts in the first person the adventures of a young
Roundhead captain by sea and land, and reproduces skillfully the
((jargon -of enthusiasm)) in which the Puritans expressed themselves.
Though a strong piece of work, it was but coldly received.

In 1907 Macphail launched The University Magazine, a quarterly
review. It had its origin in McGill University but Toronto and Dal-
housie also associated themselves in the enterprise. Macphail adopted
the principle (new in Canada) of paying contributors a living wage and
he proved himself an editor of tact and sound judgment. The policy of
paying for contributions brought out unsuspected strength of native
talent. It was even a commercial success. Not a little of the success,
however, was due to the editor's own vigorous articles. While offering
an open forum for the discussion of all problems in literature, art,
philosophy, and religion, the chief concern was Canadian and Imperial
politics.

In 1909, Macphail published a collection of his papers which had
already appeared in magazines, under the title (Essays in Politics.)
No more able or impartial political criticism had appeared in Canada.
It was free from partisan bias and the point of view was fresh.

In 1910 appeared the (Essays in Fallacy,) containing perhaps
MacphaiPs most serious and valuable criticism.

No other Canadian writer has exercised the critical faculty as widely
as Macphail, or presents such a mass of reasoned opinion upon so many
themes of perennial human interest. At times, the full force of his
judgments is not felt through the subtlety of his irony and his Scottish
preference for the understatement. Generally destructive, as criticism
must in its nature be, his discussions, especially in the domain of Cana-
dian politics, tend to build up sound national sentiment and to encourage
clear thinking.

ANDREW MACPHAIL 95I4C

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SUFFRAGETTE

From (Essays in Fallacy) Longmans, Green & Co. Copyright by Andrew

Macphail.

To get at the root of the matter, we must understand the essential
character of the feminine nature, and if we discover that it is
good, neutral, or bad, we must remember that man has made
it so. The praise or blame is to us. Therefore we are in reality
investigating ourselves. There is a German saying: From a woman
you can learn nothing of a woman. As Immanuel Kant explains it:
woman does not betray her secret. And yet, the only secret which is
well kept is that which is no secret at all. Possibly this is the reason
why women and Freemasons have been so successful in guarding
theirs. The revelation which women in their writings make of them-
selves is incomplete because they are incapable of that intellectual
effort by which complete detachment is obtained. All the ((Con-
fessions)) have been done by men, St. Augustine, Montaigne, Pepys,
Rousseau, Amiel, and by those immodest writers of the past ten years
whose confessions are so tiresome because they have so little to confess,
and therefore experience none of that reminiscitory pleasure which
makes the confessional so popular.

It was a reflection of Joseph de Maistre: ((I do not know what the
heart of a rascal may be; I know what is in the heart of an honest
man: it is horrible.)) Only a man is capable of making this true
reflection and of confessing not alone faults which do not dishonor,
but secrets which are ridiculous and mortal sins which are without
extenuation. One may well believe that Chateaubriand in his
(Memoires d'Outre-tombe,) Lamartine in his (Confidences,) Renan
in his ( Souvenirs, ) even without being consciously insincere or lacking
in veracity, refrained from mentioning those cruelly painful reminis-
cences with which Rousseau scourged himself; but one is considered
simple-minded indeed who believes that George Sand tells us as much
as she can remember in ( L'Histoire de ma Vie. ) This charge which
Mr. Jules Lemaitre brings against George Sand finds its explanation
in the fact that women really do forget. A man will deliberately
revive the remembrance of past sins for his present amendment, and
evil being turned into good, the sin is forgiven. A woman forgets
an act of meanness because it made no impression upon her mind
when she committed it. She does not understand the nature of it.
She forgives an act of meanness which a woman commits against her
because they understand each other so well.

ANDREW MACPHAIL

To arrive at an apprehension of this condition of non-morality,
we must go back to the beginning of created beings, when the prob-
lems of physiology were reduced to their simplest forms, and the
problems of psychology and ethics had not yet made their appearance ;
when the presence of life was revealed only by the appearance of
movement. As we see the living being in its lowest form, it merely
moves, eats, grows, reproduces itself, and dies. It is contractile,
irritable, receptive, assimilative, metabolic, secretory, respiratory,
and reproductive, as the books on science say. This seems a great
deal, but in reality it is very little, for it does not differentiate an
amoeba from a man.

The evolution of the animal kingdom began with the acquirement
of the first rudiments of a morality. The original amoeba was content
to wait until its food arrived in a faint swirl of water. We can well
imagine that, by some circumstance which was apparently fortuitous
but in reality due to the operation of the law of gravity and of those
principles which underlie the distribution of air, the food was brought
in unusual quantity or at an unnecessary moment. The creature,
being already surfeited, was quite willing, that the nutriment should
go to a rival. The satisfaction which was experienced as a result of
comfortable physical distention was attributed to an act of self-
abnegation, and so the foundation of morality was laid.

This illustration may be made more obvious, and perhaps less
absurd, if we consider the situation of the savage reclining before* the
fire with his family in the sanctity of his cave after a successful day's
chase, and a surfeit upon the rude but efficient cookery of those days.
We shall not be wrong if we surmise that an emotion of gratitude
might arise in his breast towards the giver of so much good and of
commiseration of a less fortunate neighbor. This laudable sentiment
might induce him to share the food which was yet uneaten, especially
if — not to credit him with too high and disinterested a morality —
he recalled that on previous occasions his surplus store had perished
by decay. Certainly he would not feel disposed to interfere with his
neighbor's chase, and so the principles of justice would be established.
It is not improbable that his neighbor at some future time would do
as he had been done by, and accordingly the growth of morality and
the bonds of amity would be strengthened. In due course game laws
would make their appearance, and out of that would arise a system
of jurisprudence to cover the various problems which must have
faced a growing, though simple, civilization.

If now it be true that morality had its origin in the mental and

ANDREW MACPHAIL 95146

physical activities attendant upon the procuring of food, and since
these activities were exercised chiefly by the male, it follows that the
female who was not brought under the influence of a favorable environ-
ment would remain non-moral. She did not come in contact with the
world, as the saying is, and continued unlearned, wanting the hard
lesson of experience. Something of a similar nature is still witnessed
in the case of those clerics who deal habitually with women, of school-
masters and professors whose world is merely that which is encountered
within the walls of a class-room, and of writers whose observation
does not extend beyond their closets. The characteristics of the
feminine nature are found in them. They are considered virtuous
because the problems of morality have never presented themselves.

Shut out from the world, the primitive woman was not free to
develop an independent life. She adapted herself to the man. His
views were her views ; his dislikes were shared by her, and she adopted
his opinions ready-made. She preferred to be dependent, and agreed
that the man should continue to mold her mentality. This" destruc-
tion of her personality and departure from her line of life became so
permanent that she enjoyed it. Her sense of personal value was lost.
It was found in external things, her beauty, her adornment, her
children, or her husband. This lightness of regard for their own
personality still persists, as we may see in the readiness with which a
woman exchanges her own name for another, not once, but under
certain circumstances — after a period of half -luxurious sorrow and
self-conscious demureness — twice, or yet again, and each time with
the greater alacrity. Without freedom there can be no free will,
and without free will there can be no character.

The primitive man in the contest with his environment developed
an ethic, a logic, and a morality, because he was free. Deprived of
freedom, the primitive woman remained servile in disposition; tyran-
nical when occasion offered, because the servant ever makes the worst
master; unjust, since she was protected against the penalty of injustice;
unsympathetic and heartless, because there was no occasion for a
wide and disinterested charity; mindless, because there was another
to think for her. Trained to accept the conventions which the man
imposed upon her, she easily submitted to the conventions devised
by her own sex, and became imitative even in the clothes which she
wore, in the method of adornment which she adopted, in the sentiments
which she entertained, and in the opinions which she expressed. In
time, "however, she adapted herself to her environment, and developed
a kind of ethic, of her own, which was entirely adequate for the cir-

ANDREW MACPHAIL

cumstances in which she was placed, but breaks down hopelessly in a
wider sphere of activity.

As if it were not enough that the woman was deprived of these
incentives to the acquisition of a morality, she was made the victim
of man's unconscious egoism and his conscious duplicity. Men in
common with other males are subject at times to a curious psychical
and physical condition which is familiarly known as ((being in love.))
The first symptom of this mental disorder is an entire incapacity to
perceive the truth. He creates an ideal woman, the woman of poetry
and other romantical writings. He attributes to her, or rather
projects into the ideal, his own qualities of truthfulness, modesty,
justice, charity, sympathy, fortitude, and beauty. To employ the
jargon of the theologians, this ideal woman is anthropomorphic.
A man who is in love with a woman is really in love with himself, but
neither the one nor the other is aware of the fact. He begins by
deceiving himself and ends by deceiving her, for a time at least, and
her futuVe life consists in the employment of every resource to en-
courage and maintain the fiction. It is not the real woman whom he
loves, but a spurious personality. To succeed in retaining this love,
she is obliged to live the life of the image which he has created, and
ends by destroying her inner self. And yet, under present conditions,
that woman succeeds best who is most successful in maintaining this
illusion in the minds of both.

This practice of loving and believing a lie is, I suspect, the fons et
origo of all that is evil in our civilization. Few men and no women are
free from the vice. Even the intelligent fall into the easy habit. In
an important city the editing of a newspaper was entrusted to ten of
the most righteous women to be found therein, and yet they assigned
the prize which had been offered for the best expression of appreciation
of their labors to a man who affirmed that their literary product
would overwhelm the city ((with a deluge of sweetness and light.))
The second prize went to a woman who predicted that much good
would be effected ((by their wisdom, their wit, and their might.))

And this leads one to the observation that nearly all writing is an
endeavor to minister to this desire for self-deception. Comparatively
few men who have attained to the great age of forty years indulge in
the pastime of reading. Their experience has taught them that the
motive of nearly all writing is the desire for notoriety, either in this
life or in the minds of those who are to come. They are wise enough
to write their own books ; but being wise, they abstain. They regard
it as a delusion that all who are capable of reading are also capable

ANDREW MACPHAIL 95I4g

of writing. As well might a man believe that he had a peculiar
aptitude for herding sheep and playing the bagpipes, because he was
born in the Highlands of Scotland. This desire of women to be de-
ceived accounts for that insincere writing which is found in nearly all
novels, and in all of those she-papers which fatten upon their credulity.
Reading, then, becomes a vapid and frivolous amusement for dazing
the mind, and a book no better than a lap-dog.

Nor does art thrive any better than literature in this atmosphere
of feminism. Art has to do with the beauty of utility, of truth. A
woman learns by instinct, possibly by experience, that personal
beauty does not imply morality, and as it is with her own personality
she is most concerned, a secret distrust in all beauty, even the beauty
of art, is instilled into her mind. Accordingly the pictures which are
painted to please her must have a superficial prettiness, and the
houses which are erected for her use will best serve her purpose if,
instead of simplicity, they display a decorated cosiness and 'have
sufficient cupboards for the accommodation of her cast-off finery.

The superfluous top-hamper of civilisation, which makes living
difficult for the rich and impossible for the poor, continues to burden
humanity because women will have it so. A world of iniquity is
created out of their desire for change. It is not love of beauty which
suddenly reveals to a woman that last year's adornment is hideous,
but the desire to change one form of ugliness for another. If she
possessed that sense of beauty which comes from sincerity, and that
in turn from freedom, she would once and for all agree upon some
practice of adornment combined with utility, which would have a
reasonable degree of permanency, rather than submit to the tyranny
of an organized band of mercenaries, who exist for the purpose of
exploiting her femininity. This passion in women for splendid
apparel arises from their suspicion that they are not in reality beautiful,
but have only been told so by men whose senses they suspect are
dulled by passion.

The value of the exercise of the suffrage by a woman is that it will
serve to emancipate her from herself in so far as it emancipates her
from men. In the present state of affairs, which is based on the Orien-
tal conception that a woman is a chattel, a private possession, born to
serve and be dependent upon man, she has no complete existence in
herself. She obtains the sense of full existence only through her
husband and children, just as the Mussulman woman attains to the
chief desire of her heart if she is chosen to give a son to the Pattisah.
She stands ready to be made wife or mother, that she may acquire

9514k ANDREW MACPHAIL

that gift; and her love is the mental sense of satisfaction that she is
about to be redeemed.

Looked at narrowly, this attempt on the part of women to emanci-
pate themselves would appear to be nothing more than the expression
of a desire to enlarge the range of their caprice, for which not even
marriage, the old and sovereign remedy, is any longer efficacious. In
reality the reason lies much deeper. It is a blind striving for the pure
air of freedom, for escape from a bondage in which only the qualities
of the servile have had room for development. Until women cease
to believe the pretty lies which men tell them, that they are only a
little lower than the angels, and discover the real bondage, their own
nature, from which they must emancipate themselves, they will not
proceed with any degree of seriousness. They will not convince the
world until they themselves are convinced. Analysis they consider
detraction, and fly from investigation in wild alarm. Upon this
subject there is a considerable body of information in the writings of
satirists, dramatists, and theologians, ancient and modern; but it is
decried as slander, whether uttered by St. Paul, Origen, Clement of
Alexandria, or Otto Weininger.

This violent effort to attain to freedom is bound to be associated
with a form of disorderliness which the common mind describes as
hysterical. All disorder in itself is bad. It is intolerable only when it
is meaningless. It is decried because it is misunderstood. Any con-
sideration of the mind of the suffragette would be quite inadequate
without some mention of those complex manifestations which are
known as hysteria. Of this too I shall offer an explanation in support
of my argument. It is a sign of the striving after a higher morality,
of an attempt to ((convert nothing into something,)) to put on a new
nature, to acquire personality, distinction, character, and mind. Up
to a certain point the woman accepts her femininity and all that is
implied thereby with unquestioning obedience, taking it at its mascu-
line value. In the absence of an external controlling influence there
comes a divine discontent with that negative condition of existence,
and she becomes imbued with moral ideas which are foreign to her
normal mind and opposed to her real nature. In reality she puts on a
superficial, sham self, and yet is incapable of perceiving the spurious-
ness of it. This new personality shows itself in self-confidence,
independence, assertiveness, a punctilious sincerity, and painful
candor in speech and action. This artificial imitation of the masculine
morality with which she has overlaid her femininity, at the touch of
some rough reality flies in pieces, and the conflict between her real

ANDREW MACPHAIL 95141

nature and this unnatural self produces those phenomena which are
known as hysteria. It is a contest between what she knows to be
true and what she suspects is false.

A woman in this condition is a piteous and degrading spectacle,
exposing her femininity naked yet unashamed, and revealing the
whole record of development in its continuous progress through those
stages which we designate as plant, beast, and savage life. To the
psychologist the phenomenon is full of interest and fruitful of instruc-
tion, but it recalls the fearful image conjured up by the words :

((And Satan yawning on his brazen seat,
Toys with the screaming thing his fiends have flayed.))

This demand for the suffrage is in reality an attempt to arrive at a
higher morality, to attain to consideration in virtue of goodness and
not of charm. The real opponents are the women who master men
by that easy device, and all men who find it so comfortable to succumb,
because they find it so alluring. There is an active and a passive
conspiracy working to the same end that women shall not be free.
There is no creature in the world who is so irritating to the woman who
is merely good as the woman who is merely charming, and therefore
in a condition of negative morality. The most efficient means to
destroy the force of any charm is to investigate its origin, a task to
which those who are striving for emancipation would do well to apply
themselves. It is not enough that they have relinquished this quality
in themselves. They can succeed only when they have removed its
possession from others.

The struggle for freedom from their own nature will not be easy.
The habits acquired during countless ages are all but ineradicable;
yet progress may appear in the exchange of one bondage for another.
One would say that the noble army of martyrs who have attacked the
inner sanctuary of the British Constitution had emancipated them-
selves from every restraint and destroyed the last attraction between
themselves and living men; and yet their next act was to bind them-
selves with physical chains to those stone images of male humanity
which stand in the Hall of St. Stephen. This thing is an allegory.

I am not blind to certain perils which lie in the way; but I think
they have been exaggerated and will tend to cure themselves. Voting
implies being voted for, and men are so fatuous that they will vote for
the woman who has a pleasing personality and skill in the adornment
of her person, rather than for a candidate of commanding intellect

9514] ANDREW MACPHAIL

and skill in the public use of her tongue. Then will arise another
noble band of martyrs after the discovery of how little men's votes for
women are influenced by reason and how much by charm. They
will declare that man shall no longer have the opportunity of being
silly, and they will banish their charming sisters from public life.

There is nothing which a man who is left to himself desires so
ardently as he desires the feminine. To attain to it he will commit
the last infamy, descending to the level of the beast from which he has
arisen, even whilst he despises himself for the surrender of that morality
which he has so laboriously acquired. This interdependence of good
and evil constitutes the riddle of the universe ; and yet it is out of this
conflict between the lower and the higher that our civilization, as we
know it, has arisen. The woman exercises her power by means of a
charm, by which she allures and then captivates. The ((fountain))
of this charm is love, and its essence ((pleasant to the eyes)) like that
fruit which first attracted the Universal Dame herself.

If the power of this charm were unchecked, it would reabsorb the
masculine idea into the feminine, so earnestly is it desired by men.
It is the business of women to see to it that this charm is exercised
with due restraint. Every child knows that a charm is broken by
speech, and if the injunction taceat mulier were observed, the masculine
would be delivered into an eternal bondage. If all women at all times
behaved themselves in accordance with the principles of the eternal
feminine, which are those of appearance and beauty, men would
become so enamored of it that they would mold their lives by it and
eventually transform themselves into women.

Compare the power of the woman who sits, and looks, and exercises
her charm in silence and mystery with her who says an inane thing
three times over with the intention of being interesting and vivacious,
or a foolish thing rather than remain silent; with her who votes and
speaks in the councils, even though she speak with the tongue of a
man and reveal all knowledge; with her who brawls in public places,
and even gives her body to the Holloway gaol, and we shall discover
the essential reason why women should be encouraged to do these
things, namely, that they shall be induced to tell the truth about
themselves and so liberate men in some degree from the power of their
charm, that reason may govern life.

The women who are not satisfied with the status of wife and
mother and are striving to educate themselves into fitting ((com-
panions)) for their husbands and sons by attending lectures and
reading magazines are unaware of the power of this charm, and are

ANDREW MACPHAIL 9514k

suffering from an exaggerated notion of the kind of companionship
for which men are capable. They magnify the masculine intelligence
unduly. What a piece of work is a man! they exclaim in rhapsody,
how noble in reason, how infinite in faculty, in form and moving how
express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension
how like a god, the beauty of the world ! In reality this ((paragon of
animals)) desires a woman more ardently than he desires a talking
book, agreeing, if he is sensible, with that eminent divine, John Calvin,
when he declared, ((The only beauty that can please my heart is one
that is gentle, chaste, modest, economical, patient, and, finally, careful
of her husband's health.))

The real grievance from which women suffer is that their authority
and claim to consideration is based upon a principle which is non-
ethical and of no inherent value in their eyes. Their way of escape
lies in convincing men that they also should arrive at a like estimate of
its fallibility. This can best be done by setting up truth in opposition
to falsehood, which is the most subtle method of iconoclasm, the most
powerful for breaking down an eidolon in which the affections are
inordinately fixed, since the deity and the devotee can then make
mutual inferences. To keep the matter scientific and impersonal,
they might begin by an investigation into the nature of the trog-
lodytic woman, disclosing her characteristics, assigning them to
their proper cause, and estimating what proportion still remains.
The opinion requires corroboration that women have been more
successful than men in purging away those qualities which were in-
herent in the primitive nature. Indeed to the most careful observer
there is some evidence that jealousy has not entirely given way to
justice, heartlessness to charity, pride to dignity, shamelessness to
modesty, selfishness to sympathy, and the desire of provoking com-
passion to a self-reliant fortitude.

This investigation might properly be undertaken by the various
Councils of Women, even at the risk of excluding those subjects upon
which they possess no especial information, such as the effect of
narcotics and intoxicants upon the masculine frame. A frank pro-
nouncement from this high quarter would be free from the taunt that
it was merely slander, diatribe, or vituperation. To make the inquiry
sufficiently extensive, it might be well to appoint a committee of men
to prepare an agendum for the meeting, a labor in which I would
willingly bear a part, having a desire for specific information upon
certain points, namely: why up to a certain age a younger sister
dislikes the elder, and between certain ages a mother is averse to her

95141- ANDREW MACPHAIL

daughter; why the law of modesty in apparel is not constant at nine
o'clock in the evening and nine o'clock in the morning; why it is
painful for a woman to witness another advancing in social status;
why female beauty and an adornment which heightens it does not
excite an emotion of universal pleasure; why women make good
nurses, if it is not because they are lacking in sympathy.

For women, then, there are two lines of conduct open, and only
two. Either they must remain within the cave, as ((sisters to the
flowers,)) in an environment suitable for the development of such
qualities as may be developed from the essentially feminine nature, an
easy docility, a pleasurable obedience, meekness, forbearance, long-
suffering, patience, silence; as objects upon which men may lavish
protection, kindness, benevolence, affection, and so stimulate their
own masculine morality, and redeem themselves in virtue of the love
which is created thereby: or they must aspire to a perfect freedom;
casting aside the curb of sex and freeing themselves from the tyranny
of kith and kin, they must come out into the world and remain out in
the full glare of the sun, ruthlessly exposing their nature to the rough
environment whereby its imperfections will be scourged and chastened
away. Possibly that nature might perish in the process before a new
one was created, and in any event it might be nothing more than a
close approximation to the male.

There is no middle station, half in and half out, exposing the evil
and doing nothing for its amendment. This tentative standing-
ground merely permits of a sudden release of the nature of the
primitive woman in all its nakedness unchecked from within and
uncontrolled from without. The spectacle is so revolting, I fear, that
most women would turn back with grief and hatred of it to their old
rule, rather than strive with a full purpose and endeavor after a new
obedience. That is the essential difficulty with which those women
have to contend, who would lead their sisters out of bondage. Their
real enemies are of their own household, who hate to see this revelation
that women make of themselves, which affords to vulgar satirists
congenial exercise of their irony and scoff, for the torment or amuse-
ment of those who, like themselves, by continually regarding humanity
as it is, have developed a capacity for analysis at the expense of a
certain dryness and hardness of heart.

These satirists smile and whisper in our ear that the emancipation
of women is intended only to enlarge the bounds of their caprice;
that their performance is of no immediate interest to the man, and
only of very remote benefit to the woman; that, when he grows tired

ANDREW MACPHAIL 9514 in

of the farce, he will cast her out of the cave and leave her to her own
device as he was left in the day of his creation. From this they con-
clude that a race which allows itself to be brought to such an impasse
is not worth reproducing, and we cannot blame them too severely.
It is on account of their perception of this fact that the women of
primitive communities deal faithfully with their unruly sisters lest a
worse thing befall themselves. There is a choice between the good and
the best as there is between the evil and the good; and women must
find in freedom compensation for having cast out the imputed sacred-
ness from their lives; and, in watching the gyrations of their souls,
some recompense for that calm leisure in which they were wont to
dream.

This then is the end of the argument in favor of the suffragette,
which is developed out of her own psychology. Women have ob-
tained their places in the' world because they are desired by men on
grounds which are not of the highest ethical quality; but these are the
only grounds upon which men will consent to endure the burden of
carrying on a society, about whose invention they were not consulted.
We are now — men and women, not as opponents but as companions
in a misery which we should do our best to assuage by mutual help — -
face to face with the real problem: Shall we allow the evil to endure,
or even suffer the good to remain as the enemy of the best, saying
with the sluggard, a little more sleep, a little more slumber; or shall we
strive after the higher morality, even losing our life that we may save
it?

It is no bar to the argument that it faces the extinction of the
species to which we belong. In a question of morality consequences
do not count. We did not create ourselves. The responsibility of
ceasing to exist does not rest upon us. It is in reality a question of
conduct, and upon that we can always get information if we inquire
of Him whose genius for right living was such that a large proportion
of mankind have agreed upon Him as the chief exemplar and pat-
tern of pure right eousness. The problem presented itself to Him. He
answered it in specific terms. Three times and in separate places are
the question and answer recorded in words which are almost identical :
What good thing shall I do that I may inherit eternal life; what lack I
yet? What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? What shall I
do to inherit eternal life? To convince us that the answer is not pne
of special application, the question is repeated thrice in general terms
and so recorded: Who then can be saved? Who then can be saved?
Who then can be saved? The answer invariably is that those who t

95I4H ANDREW MACPHAIL

would inherit everlasting life must first forsake certain things which
are specifically set forth, and the enumeration ends in all cases with
((woman.)) One is quite prepared to be told that Paul was ill-informed
or ill-natured, when he declared that even the intimacy with a woman
which is implied by marriage is a drag in the attempt after a higher
life, and yet protest, in face of that exegetic feat which attributes the
insertion of the fatal word to a monkish hand, that Jesus really meant
something when He said that she must be forsaken.

All things are working toward this divine end by making it easy
to forsake the woman. As that kind of intelligence is developed by
higher education, as it is called with a certain degree of assumption,
which consists in an increased capacity for the recollection of unrelated
statements, a measure of value is created which men can understand.
The}7" are dealing in their own currency. Pedantry they have already
witnessed, and the instructed woman is even less adorable than a
professor. An imitation of the garb which is customary in the male
at once suggests the form which it is intended to conceal and a com-
parison with the standards of abstract beauty. When women place
themselves in situations for which they, are not qualified by their
nature to fill with obvious advantage they become a ridiculous carica-
ture of themselves. The mind of the suffragette appears to possess a
peculiar aptitude for that absurdity which makes a man impatient and
finally contemptuous of all femininity, and resolute to adhere to his
own ideal. A woman may be foolish and yet be charming. She
emancipates herself when she becomes an object of aversion.

95^5

EMERICH MADACH

(1823-1864)

BY GEORGE ALEXANDER KOHUT

[UNGARY is a favorite land of the Muses. Romance, ardent
sentiment, and a certain mystic fervor give to her poetry an
exquisite charm. A thrill of fire and passion vibrates in her
songs and melodies. Her folk-lore and ancient traditions teem with
rich Oriental imagery and beautiful conceptions. These ancient gems
have in the present century received a fresh setting at the hands of
the literary artists, who have borne witness
to the unabated vigor of this people <( barbar-
ously grand. » Of the modern school, Petofi
the lyric poet and Madach the dramatic are
the most popular poets of Hungary.

Madach Imre (for the family name comes
first in Hungarian) was born in Also Sztre-
gova, Hungary, January 2ist, 1823; and died
in his native town October 5th, 1864. Of
his life little need be told. He was notary,
orator, and journalist; at an early age he
wrote a number of essays on natural science,
archaeology, and aesthetics. He wrote lyric
as well as dramatic poetry; .but it is chiefly
through his two dramatic poems, < Moses >

and <The Tragedy of Man,> written almost simultaneously in 1860,
that he is best known. An edition of his collected writings, in three
volumes, was issued by Paul Gyulai in Budapest, 1880. His master-
piece, <The Tragedy of Man,> has been rendered into German no less
than five times; the latest version, by Julius Lechner von der Lech
(Leipzig, 1888, with a preface by Maurice Jokai), being the most feli-
citous. Alexander Fischer gave a splendid re'sumt of this powerful
drama in Sacher-Masoch's periodical, Auf der Hohe (Vol. xvi., 1885),
— the only analysis of it in any language except Hungarian. Though
it is too philosophical and contemplative in character, and not in-
tended for the stage, its first production, which took place in Septem-
ber 1883, created an immense sensation both in Austria and Hungary.
To English readers, Madach is a total stranger. His name is
scarcely ever found in -any encyclopaedia or biographical dictionary;

EMERICH MADACH

95 1<> EMERICH MADACH

and strangely enough, no attempt has been thus far made to give
even a selection from this latter-day Milton of Hungary.

It is not here intended to explain the origin and inner development
of this fascinating jlrama, nor to draw elaborate parallels between
its author and his predecessors in other lands. Such a comparative
critical study would be interesting as showing the spiritual kinship
between master minds, centuries distant from one another, whose
sympathies are in direct touch with our own ideals and life problems.

Madach will plead his own cause effectively enough. To him, how-
ever, who in reading the ( Tragedy of Man * involuntarily makes such
comparisons, and might be led unjustly to question the author's ori-
ginality, the graceful adage Grosse Geister treffen sick (Great minds
meetj will serve as an answer. He should rather say, with true
artistic estimate, that the shading in the one landscape of a higher
life helps to set off the vivid and brilliant coloring in the other; so
that the whole, viewed side by side, presents a series of wondrous
harmonies. Madach imbibed, no doubt, from foreign sources. He
was familiar with c Paradise Lost,* and with the now obsolete but
once much-lauded epic, < La Semaine > (The Week), of Milton's French
predecessor Du Bartas; Alfieri's tramelogedia, 'Abele,* and Gesner's
< Death of Abel,* as well as Byron's ( Mystery of Cain,* may also have
come to his notice ; Goethe's ( Faust * appears more than once, and may
be recognized in any incognito. Yet we cannot say with certainty
that any one of these masterpieces influenced his own work, any more
than Milton inspired the great German bard. We might as justly
tax him with drawing upon Hebrew tradition for the entire plot of
his drama, beginning with the fourth scene; for strangely enough,
Adam's expe'riences with his mentor and Nemesis, Lucifer, are fore-
shadowed in the very same manner in a quaint legend of the Jewish
Rabbis, told nearly twenty centuries ago. The comparative study
of literature will reveal other facts equally amazing. It is of course
self-evident that the morbid pessimism which rings its vague alarms
throughout the book is that of Ecclesiastes, whose vanitas vanitatum
is the key to his doleful plaint.

ttl applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom concerning all
that is done under heaven: it is a sore travail that God hath given to the
sons of men to be exercised therewith. I have seen all the works that are
done under the sun ; and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. . . .
And I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly; I
perceived that this also was a striving after wind. For in much wisdom is
much grief; and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow. w (Eccl. i.
12-18.)

This is the leading theme, and Lessing's soulful simile of the
ideal, the grand morale: — (<If God held trutn^in his right hand," says
he, <( and in his left the mere striving after truth, bidding me choose

EMERICH MADACH

between the two, I would reverently bow to his left and say, (Give
but the impulse ; truth is for thee alone ! ) }>

Thus, after traversing many lands the world over; after plunging
Into every pleasure and being steeped in every vice; after passions
human and divine have had their sway over his spirit, — Adam con-
cedes to Lucifer that the world of ideals is illusory, existing only in
fancy, thriving but in our own souls, nourished by sentiment, and
supersensitive to the touch of grosser things. And yet the echo
which answers his sad pleadings, as he cries out disheartened —

<( O sacred poetry, hast thou then
Quite forsaken this prosy world of our»? }>

is a wholly unexpected one in the grand finale. It teaches the
doctrine of eternal hope, as the great Hebrew pessimist Koheleth
summed it up, when only the Hellenic intellect reigned supreme and
the Hellenic heart was cold: —

(< I have decreed, O man — strive ye and trust P*

The ideal conquers in the end, should life and love not fail. Poetry
and sentiment transform even this valley of the shadow of death into
a Paradise regained. It is a song of the ideals in which salvation
lies; and the words of the Lord with which the poem closes are,
(< Struggle and trust. }>

FROM THE < TRAGEDY OF MAN>
SEVENTH SCENE

Scene: An open square in Constantinople. A few citizens lounging about.
In the centre the palace of the Patriarch; to the right a cloister; to the
left a grove. Adam as Tancred, in the prime of life, is seen advan-
cing at the head of returning Crusaders, accompanied by other knights, •
with colors flying and drums beating; Lucifer as his armor-bearer.
Evening, then night.

FIRST CITIZEN — Behold, there comes another horde of heathen;
Oh, flee and double-bar the doors, lest they
Again the whim to plunder feel!
Second Citizen — Hide ye the women: but too well

Knows this rebel the joys of the seraglio.

EMERICH MADACH

First Citizen — And our wives the rights of the conqueror.
Adam — Hold ! hold ! why scatter in such haste ?

Do ye not see the holy sign aloft

That makes us brothers in humanity

And companions to one goal ? —

We bore the light of our faith, the law

Of love, into Asia's wilds,

That the savage millions there

Where our Savior's cradle stood •

Might share sweet salvation's boon.

Kjiow ye not this brotherly love ?
First Citizen — Full many a time through honeyed words

Swift harm befell our homes.

[They disperse.}

Adam [to the knights} —

Behold, this is the accursed result

When scheming vagabonds

The sacred symbol flaunt,

And flattering the passions, of the mob,

Presume unasked to lead. —

Fellow knights! Until our swords

To honor fair, to praise of God,

To women's guard, to bravery,

Be sanctified, — are we in duty bound

This demon foul in constant check to hold,

That in spite of godless inclination,

He great and noble deeds may do.
Lucifer — That sounds well. But, Tancred, what if the people

Do but spurn thy leadership ?
Adam — Where spirit is, is also victory.

I'll crush them to the earth!
Lucifer — And should spirit with them alike abide,

Wilt thou descend to them ?
Adam — . Why descend?

Is it not nobler to lift them up to me ?

To yield for lack of fighters

The foremost place in battle, were

As unworthy as to reject a comrade

In envy of his share of victory.
Lucifer — Alack! how the grand idea has come to naught

For which the martyrs of the circus fought!

Is this the freedom of equality ?

A wondrous brotherhood were that!

EMERICH MADACH 9519

Adam — Oh, cease thy scorn! Think not that I misprize

Christianity's exalted precepts.

My being yearns for them alone!
Whoever hath the spark divine may strive;

And him who upward toils to us

With joy we surely will receive.

A sword-cut lifts him to our ranks.
But guard we must our ranks with jealous eye
Against the still fermenting chaos here.
Would that our time were already near!
For only then can we be quite redeemed
When every barrier falls — when all is pure.
And were he who set this universe in motion
Not himself the great and mighty God,
I must needs doubt the dawn of such a day.
Ye have seen, O friends, how we have been received:
Orphaned amidst the tumult of the town,
Naught now remains save in yonder grove
A tent to pitch, as we were wont among the infidels,
Till better times shall come. Go; I follow soon.
Every knight stands sponsor for his men.

[The Crusaders pitch their tent.}

Lucifer — What a pity that thy spirit's lofty flight
Even now begets such sorry fruit;
Red without, within already rotten!
Adam — Stop !

Hast thou no longer faith in lofty thought?
Lucifer — What boots it thee if I believe,

When thine own race doth doubt ?
This knighthood which thou hast placed
As lighthouse amid ocean's waves,
Will yet die out, or half collapse,
And make the sailor's course even more fearful
Than before, when no light shone before his way.
What lives to-day and blessing works,
Dies with time; the spirit takes wing
And the carcass but remains, to breathe
Murderous miasmas into the fresher life
Which round him buds. Behold, thus
Survive from bygone times our old ideals.
Adam — Until our ranks dissolve, its sacred teachings
Will have had effect upon the public mind.
I fear no danger then.

9520

EMERICH MADACH

Lucifer — The holy teachings! They are your curse indeed,
When ye approach them unawares,
For ye turn, sharpen, split, and smooth
Them o'er so long, till they your phantoms
Or your chains become.

And though reason cannot grasp exact ideas,
Yet ye presumptuous men do always seek
To forge them — to your harm.

Look thou upon this sword! It may by a hair's-breadth
Longer be or shorter, and yet remains the same
In substance. The door is opened thus to endless specula-
tion;

For where is there limit pre-imposed?
'Tis true your feelings soon perceive the right
When change in greater things sets in. —
But why speak and myself exert ? Speech
Is wearisome. Turn thou, survey the field thyself.
Adam — Friends, my troops are tired and shelter crave.
In the Capital of Christendom they will
Perchance not crave in vain.,
Third Citizen —

The question is, whether as heretics
Ye're not worse than infidels! . . .
Adam — I stand aghast! But see — what prince

Approaches from afar, so haughtily defiant?
Lucifer — The Patriarch — successor to the Apostles.

Adam — And this barefoot, dirty mob

Which follows with malicious joy
In the captive's wake,
Feigning humility ?

Lucifer — They are monks, Christian cynics.

Adam — I saw not such among my native hills.

Lucifer — You'll see them yet. Slowly, slowly

Spreads the curse of leprosy;
But beware how you dare insult
This people, so absolute in virtue and
Hence so hard to reconcile.

Adam — What virtue could adorn such folk as this ?

Lucifer — Their worth is abnegation, poverty,

As practiced first by the Master on the Cross.
Adam — He saved a world by such humility;

While these cowards, like rebels,
Do but blaspheme tne name of God,
In that they despise his gift.

EMERICH MADACH 95 2 T

Who 'gainst gnats the weapons same would draw
That in the bear hunt he is wont to use
Is a fool.

Lucifer — But if they in pious zeal, perchance,

Mistake the gnats for monstrous bears,
Have they then not the right to drive
To the very gates of hell
Those who life enjoy ? . . .
Adam {facing the Patriarch} —

Father, we're battling for the Holy Grave,
And wearied from the way which we have come,
To rest within these walls we are denied.
Thou hast power here : help thou our cause.
Patriarch —

My son, I have just now no time for petty things.
God's glory and my people's weal
Call higher aims now forth. I must away
To judge the heretics; who, like poisonous weeds,
Do grow and multiply, and whom hell
With force renewed upon us throws,
Even though we constant try with fire and sword
To root them out.

But if indeed ye be true Christian knights,
Why seek the Moor so far remote ?
Here lurks a yet more dangerous- foe.
Scale ye their walls, level them to the ground,
And spare ye neither woman, child, nor hoary head.
Adam — The innocent! O father, this cannot be thy wish!
Patriarch —

Innocent is the serpent, too, while yet of tender growth
Or after its fangs are shed.
Yet sparest thou the snake ?
Adam — It must, in faith, have been a grievous sin

Which could such wrath from Christian love evoke.
Patriarch —

O my son! not he shows love who feeds the flesh,
But he who leadeth back the erring soul,
At point of sword, — or e'en through leaping flames
If needs must be,- to Him who said:
Not peace but war do I proclaim !
That wicked sect interprets false
The mystic Trinity. . . .
Monks — Death upon them all!

There burns the funeral pile.

EMERICH MADACH

Adam — My friend, give up the iota, pray:

Your inspired valor in fighting
For the Savior's grave will be
More fitting sacrifice than this.
An Old Heretic—

Satan, tempt us not! We'll bleed
For our true faith where God ordains.
One of the Monks —

Ha, renegade ! thou boastest of true faith ? . .
Patriarch —

Too long have we tarried here: away with them
To the funeral pyre, in honor of God!
The Old Heretic—

In honor of God ? Thou spakest well, O knave !
In honor of God are we indeed your prey.
Ye are strong, and can enforce your will
As ye may please. But whether ye have acted rightly
Heaven alone will judge. Even now is weighed,
At every hour, your vile career of crime.
New champions shall from our blood arise;
The idea lives triumphant on; and coming centuries
Shall the light reflect of flames that blaze to-day.
Friends, go we to our glorious martyrdom!
The Heretics {chanting in chorus} —

My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ?

Why art thou so far from helping me

And from the words of my roaring ?

O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou

Hearest not; and in the night season,

And am not silent. But thou art holy!

(Psalm xxii.)
Monks [breaking in] —

Plead my cause, O Lord, with them that strive with me;

Fight against them that fight against me;

Take hold of shield and buckler and stand up for mine help;

Draw out also the spear, and stop the way

Against them that persecute me.

(Psalm xxxv.)

[In the interim the Patriarch and the procession go by. The monks with
tracts mingle among the Crusaders}

Lucifer — Why silent thus and horrified?

Dost hold this to be a tragedy?
Consider it a comedy, and 'twill make thee laugh.

EMERICH MADACH

9523

Adam — Nay, spare thy banter now! Can one

For a mere iota go firmly thus to death?
What then is the lofty and sublime?
Lucifer — • That which to others may seem droll.

Only a hair divides these two ideas;
A voice in the heart alone may judge betwixt them,
And the mysterious judge is sympathy,
Which, blindly, at one time deifies,
Then with brutal scorn condemns to death.

Adam — Why must my eyes be witness of these varied sins?
The subtleties of proud science, and of sophistry!
That deadly poison wondrously so sipped
From the sweetest, gayest, freshest flowers?
I knew this flower once in the budding time
Of our oppressed faith. Where is the wanton hand

That ruthlessly destroyed it?
Lucifer — The wanton hand is victory,

Which wide-spread once, a thousand wishes wakes,
Danger allies, and martyrs makes,
And strength endues;
'Tis there among the heretics.

Adam — Verily, I'd cast away my sword and turn me

To my northern home, where, in the glades
Of the shadowy woods primeval,
Stern manliness, true artlessness yet dwell,
And the rancor of this smooth-tongued age defy.
I would return but for a voice that lisps
The constant message in my ears,
That I alone am called to re-create this world.
Lucifer— Love's labor lost; for unaided thou canst

Ne'er prevail against the ruling spirit of the age.
The course of time is a mighty stream, —
It buries thee or bears thee;
Nor canst thou hope to guide it,
But only swim adrift the tide.
Who in history immortal shine,
And wield uncommon power,
Knew well the time in which they lived,
Yet did not themselves the thought create.
Not because the cock crows does day dawn,
But the cock crows with the dawn of day;
Yonder those who, fettered, fly to face
The terrors of a death of martyrdom,
See scarce a step ahead.

EMERICH MADACH

The thought but just conceived dawns in their midst

In the throes of death they hail so joyfully,—

The thought which by a care-free posterity

Will be inhaled with the air they breathe.

But leave thou this theme! Glance toward thy tent:

What unclean monks stroll about there?

What trade they drive, what speeches make

And gestures wild, insane ?

Let's nearer draw, and hearken !
A Monk in the centre of a crowd of Crusaders —

Buy ye, brave warriors; neglect ye not

This manual of penance:

'Twill clear all doubt of conscience;

You'll learn therein much weighty mystery:

How many years in hell will burn*

Each murderer, thief, and ravisher,

And he who doth our doctrines spurn;

It tells ye what the rich may buy

For a score or more of solidi;

And the poor for three alone

May swift obtain salvation's boon;

Whilst even he, to be quite fair,

Who such a sum cannot well spare,

May for a thousand lashes, mind,

Salvation bring upon his kind.

Buy ye, buy ye, this precious book!
The Crusaders —

Here, father, here, give us a copy too!
Adam — Infamous trader, and still more wicked patrons,

Draw ye the sword and end this foul traffic!
Lucifer {confused} —

I beg your pardon. This monk has long my partner been.

Not so deeply do I this world despise;

When praise of God soared high,

My homage also rose aloft,

Whilst thine remained becalmed. . . ' .
Adam — Help me, O Lucifer! Away, away from here!

Lead back my future into past,

That I my fate no longer see,
Nor view a fruitless strife. Pray let me think

If wisdom is to thwart my destiny!
Lucifer — Awake then, Adam, — thy dream is o'er.

EMERICH MADACH

FIFTEENTH SCENE

Scene: A garden of palms. Adam, young again, enters from his bower;
still half asleep, he looks about in astonishment. Lucifer stands in
the middle of the scene. It is a radiant day.

ADAM — Ye weird scenes and haggard forms,
How have ye left me lone!
Joys and smiles greet now my path,
As once of yore before my heart was broken.
Lucifer — O boastful man, is it thy wish, perchance,

That Nature for thy sake her law should change, —
A star appoint to mark thy loss,
Or shake the earth because a worm has died?
Adam — Have I dreamed, or am I dreaming still?
And is our life aught but a dream at last
Which makes an inanimate mass to live
But for a moment, then lets it fade forever?
Oh why, why this brief glimpse of consciousness,
Only to view the terrors of annihilation ?
Lucifer — Thou mournest ? Only cowards bend

Their necks to yoke, and unresisting stand
When yet the blow may be averted.
But unmurmuring doth the strong man
Decipher the mystic runes eternal
Of his destiny, caring but to know
If he himself can thrive beneath their doom.
The might of Fate controls the world's great course;
Thou art but a tool and blindly onward driven.
Adam — Nay, nay, thou liest! for the will of man is free;
That at least I've well deserved,
And for it have resigned my Paradise!
My phantom dreams have taught me much;
Full many a madness have I left behind,
And now 'tis mine to choose another path.
Lucifer — Ay, if forgetting and eternal hope
Were not to destiny so closely wed.
The one doth heal thy bleeding wounds,
The other closely screens abysmal depths,
And gives new courage, saying, —
Rash hundreds found a grave therein,
Thou shalt be the first safely to leap it o'er.
Hast thou not, scholar, full oft beheld
The many freaks and whims among

EMERICH MADACH

The parasites that brood and breed
In cats and owls only,
But must pass in mice their earliest stage
Of slow development?
Not just the one or other mouse
Predestined is the claw to feel
Of cat or owl; who cautious is
May even both avoid, and keep
In ripe old age his nest and house.
A relentless hand doth yet provide
Just such a number for his foes
As its presence here on earth
Ages hence insures.
Nor is the human being bound,
And yet the race wears chains.
Zeal carries thee like a flood along:
To-day for this, for that to-morrow,
The funeral pyres will their victims claim,
And of scoffers there will be no lack;
While he who registers the count
Will be in wonder lost, that wanton fate
Should have maintained such rare consistency
In making, matching, marring,
In virtue, faith, and sin and death,
In suicide and lunacy.
Adam — Hold! An inspiration fires my brain;

I may then thee, Almighty God, defy.

Should fate but cry to life a thousand halts,

I'd laugh serene and die, should I so please.

Am I not lone and single in this world ?

Before me frowns that cliff, beneath whose base

Yawns the dark abysmal gulf.

One leap, the final scene, and I shall cry —

Farewell, the farce at last is ended!

[Adam approaches the cliff, as Eve appears.'}

Lucifer — Ended! What simple-minded phrases!
Is not each moment end and
Beginning too ? Alas ! and but for this
Hast thou surveyed millennial years to come ?
Eve — I pray thee, Adam, why didst steal off from me?
Thy last cold kiss still chills my heart;
And even now, sorrow or anger sits
Upon thy brow; I shrink from thee!

EMERICH MADACH 9537

Adam [going ori\ —

Why follow me ? Why dog my footsteps ?
The ruler of creation, man,
Has weightier things to do
Than waste in sportive love his days.
Woman understands not; is a burden only.
[Softening} —

Oh, why didst thou not longer slumber?
Far harder now the sacrifice will be
. That I for future ages offer must.
Eve — Shouldst hear me, lord, 'twill easier be:

What doubtful was, is now assured, —
The future.

Adam — How now?

Eve — The hope my lips thus fain would lisp

Will lift the cloud and clear thy brow.
Come then a little nearer, pray!
O Adam, hear: I am a mother.
Adam [sinking upon his knee} —

Thou hast conquered me, O Lord!
Behold, in the dust I lie.

Without thee as against thee I strive in vain;
Thou mayest raise me up or strike me down, —
I bare my heart and soul before thee.
God {appearing, surrounded by angels} —

Adam, rise, and be thou not cast down.
Behold, I take thee back to me,
Reconciled by my saving grace.
Lucifer [aside] —

Family scenes are not my specialty.
They may affect the heart,
But the mind shrinks from such monotony;
Methinks I'll slink away. [About to go.

God — Lucifer! I'll have a word with thee, — remain!
And thou, my son, confess what troubles thee.
Adam — Fearful images haunted me, O Lord,

And what was true therein I cannot tell;
Intrust to me, I beg, I supplicate,
The mystery of all my future state.
Is there naught else besides this narrow life
Which, becoming clarified like wine,
Thou mayest spill with every whim of thine,
And dust may drink it ?
Or didst thou mean the soul for higher things ?

95*3

EMERICH MADACH

Will further toil and forward stride my kind,
Still growing nobler, till we perfection find
Near thine almighty Throne ?

Or drudge to death like some blind treadmill-horse
Without the hope of ever changing course ?
Doth noble striving meet with just reward,
When he who for ideals gives his blood

Is mocked at by a soulless throng ?
Enlighten me; grateful will I bear my lot:

I can but win by such exchange,

For this suspense is hell.
God — Seek not to solve the mystery

Which Godly grace and sense benign

Hath screened from human sight.

If thou couldst see that transient is

The soul's sojourn upon this world,

And that it upward soars

To life unending, in the great beyond, —

Sorrow would no virtue be.

If dust absorbed thy soul alike,

What would spur thee on to thought?

Who would prompt thee to resign

Thy grosser joys for virtue fine ?

Whilst now, though burdened with life,

Thy future beckons from afar,
. Shimmering through the clouds

And lifting thee to higher spheres.
And should, at times, this pride thy heart inflame,
Thy span of life will soon control thy pace,
And nobleness and virtue reign supreme.
Lucifer \laughing derisively} —

Verily, glory floods the paths you tread,
Since greatness, virtue, are to lead thee on.
Two words which only pass in. blessed deed
When superstition, ignorance, and prejudice

Keep constant guard and company. —
Why did I ever seek to work out great ideas
Through man, of dust and sunbeams formed,
So dwarfed in knowledge, in blind error so gigantic ?
Adam — Cease thy scorn, O Lucifer! cease thy scorn!
I saw full well thy wisdom's edifice,

Wherein my heart felt only chilled;
But, gracious God, who shall sustain me now
And lead me onward in the paths of right,

EMERICH MADACH

Since thou didst withdraw the hand that guided me,
Before I tasted fruit of idle knowledge ?

God — Strong is thine arm, full thy heart of lofty thoughts;
The field is boundless where thou seed shouldst sow.
Give thou but heed! A voice shall ceaseless call thee back.
Or constant speed thee on:
Follow its lead. And if at times
This heavenly sound be hushed in midst the whirl
Of thine eventful years, the purer soul
Of woman, unselfish, pure, and gentle,
Will surely hear it, and thrilled by woman's love,
Thy soul shall soar in Poetry and Song!
And by thy side she loyally will watch,
Mounted on these cherubim,
In sorrow pale or rosy joy,
A cheering, soothing genius.
Thou too, O Lucifer, a link but art
In my wide universe; so labor on!
Thy frosty knowledge and thy mad denial
Will cause, like yeast, the mind to effervesce.
E'en though it turns him from the beaten track,
It matters not. He'll soon return;
But endless shall thy penance be,
Since thou art ever doomed to see
How beauty buds and virtue sprouts
From the seed thou wouldst have spoiled.

Chorus of Angels

Choice between the good and evil,

Wondrous thought, sublime decision!

Still to know that thou art shielded
By a gracious God's provision.

For the right, then, be thou steadfast,
Though thou labor without meed;

Thy reward shall be the knowledge
Thou hast done a noble deed.

Greatness grows in goodness only;

Shame will keep the good man just,
And the fear of shame uplifts him,

While the mean man crawls in dust.

But when treading paths exalted,
This blind error cherish not, —

9530 EMERICH MADACH

That the glory thou achievest
Adds to God's a single jot:

For he needs not thy assistance

To accomplish his designs;
Be thou thankful if he calls thee

And a task to thee assigns.

Eve — Praise be to God, I understand thife song.
Adam — I divine the message and submit to its decree.

Ah, could I only the distant end foresee!
God — I have ordained, O man, —

Struggle thou and trust!

Translated for <A Library of the World's Best Literature > by G. A. Kotnat

JAMES MADISON

(1751-1836)

|HE writings of James Madison were designed to serve the
ends of practical politics. Yet, despite the absence of a lit-
erary motive, they possess qualities which entitle them to
a permanent place in American literature. Madison's papers in the
Federalist, for example, are models of political essay-writing.

James Madison was the son of a wealthy planter of Orange
County, Virginia, and was born at Port Con way, March i6th, 1751.
He was graduated at Princeton in 1772. Two years later, at the
age of twenty-three, he was appointed a member of the Committee
of Public Safety for Orange County; and thenceforward, .with a few
unimportant interruptions, took an active part in politics until 1817,
when, at the close of his second term as President of the United
States, he retired permanently from public life.

His first notable publication was a paper entitled <A Memorial
and Remonstrance, > addressed to the General Assembly of Virginia.
It appeared in 1785, and was directed against a bill providing for a
tax "for the support of teachers of the Christian religion, » the vote
on which in the Legislature he had with difficulty been able to post-
pone. Copies of the paper were distributed throughout the State, with
the result that in the next election religious freedom was made a test
question. In the session of the Legislature which followed the elec-
tion the obnoxious bill was defeated, and in place thereof was enacted
the bill establishing religious freedom offered by Jefferson seven years
before. The Religious Freedom Act disestablished the Episcopal
Church in Virginia, and abolished religious tests for public office.

Madison's chief work both as a constructive statesman and as a
publicist was done in connection with the Constitutional Convention
of 1787. The epithet <( Father of the Constitution, }) sometimes applied
to him, is not undeserved, inasmuch as he was the author of the
leading features of that instrument. In common with others, he
had for some time seen the impossibility of maintaining an effective
government under the Articles of Confederation. With the thorough-
ness characteristic of his nature, he had made a study of ancient and
modern confederacies, — including, as his notes show, the Lycian, the
Amphictyonic, the Achaean, the Helvetic, the Belgic, and the Ger-
man,— with a view to discovering the proper remedy for the defects

9532

JAMES MADISON

in the Articles of Confederation. Before the convention met, he laid
before his colleagues of the Virginia delegation the outlines of the
scheme of government that was presented to the convention as the
<( Virginia plan." .This plan was introduced at the beginning of
the convention by Edmund Randolph, who, by virtue of his office as
governor of Virginia, was regarded as the member most fit to speak
for the delegation; but its chief supporter in the debate which fol-
lowed was Madison. The fundamental defect of the government
created by the Articles of Confederation was that it operated on
States only, not upon individuals. The delegates to the Continental
Congress were envoys from sovereign States rather than members
of a legislative body. They might deliberate and advise, but had
no means of enforcing their decisions. Thus they were empowered
to determine the share of the expenses of the general government
which each State should pay, but were unable to coerce a delinquent
State. The Virginia plan contemplated a government essentially the
same as that created by the Constitution; with this difference, that it
provided for representation according to population, both in the upper
and in the lower house of the legislature. The hand of Madison is
also seen in some of the provisions of the Constitution which were
not contained in the Virginia plan. Thus, for instance, he was the
author of the famous compromise in accordance with which, for
purposes of direct taxation and of representation, five slaves were
counted as three persons.

During the convention Madison kept a journal of its debates, which
forms the chief authority for the deliberations of that historic body.
This journal, together with his notes on the proceedings of the Con-(
tinental Congress from November 1782 to February 1783, was pur-
chased by the government after his death; both have been published
by order of Congress under the title of <The Madison Papers. > It
may here be noted also that the remainder of his writings, including
his correspondence, speeches, etc., from 1769 to 1836, have been pub-
lished by the government in a separate work, entitled ( Writings of
James Madison. J

After the adjournment of the convention Madison devoted his
energies toward securing the ratification of the Constitution. He not
only successfully opposed the eloquence and prestige of Patrick Henry
and Richard Henry Lee in the Virginia ratifying convention, but also
wrote with Hamilton and Jay that series of essays, appearing origi-
nally in certain New York newspapers, which has been preserved in
book form under the title of <The Federalist'; and which, though
intended primarily to influence the action of the extremely doubtful
State of New York, served to reinforce the arguments of the advo-
cates of ratification in other States also.

JAMES MADISON

'The Federalist y is composed of eighty-five essays; of which, ac-
cording to the memorandum made by Madison, he wrote twenty-nine,
Hamilton fifty-one, and Jay five, — one or two being written jointly.
It discussed the utility of the proposed union, the inefficiency of the
existing Confederation, the necessity of a government at least equally
energetic with the one proposed, the conformity of the Constitution to
the true principles of republican government, its analogy to the State
constitutions, and the additional security which its adoption would give
to liberty and property. Madison's papers defined republican govern-
ment, and surveyed the powers vested in the Union, the relations
between the Federal and State governments, the distribution of power
among the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the govern-
ment, and the structure of the legislative department; taking up in
conjunction with the last-mentioned subject most of the vital ques-
tions, both theoretical and practical, connected with representative
institutions.

Madison wrote in the style that prevailed at the close of • the
eighteenth century. His language, while occasionally involved and
heavy with orotund Latin derivatives, is rhythmical, dignified, and
impressive. His writings have no imagination, wit, or humor; but
the absence of these qualities is atoned for by clearness, sincerity,
and aptness of illustration. Possessed of depth and genuineness of
feeling coupled with an extraordinary power of logical exposition, he
was considered by Jefferson, some years after the adoption of the
Constitution, to be the only writer in the Republican party capable of
opposing Alexander Hamilton, the Federalist <( colossus of debate."

At the opening of the First Congress, Madison took his seat in
the House of Representatives, — the influence of Henry and the Anti-
Federalists in the Virginia State Legislature having prevented his
election to the Senate. In the differentiation of parties occasioned by
Hamilton's nationalizing financial policy, Madison allied himself with
the Republicans and became the leader of the opposition in the
House. His change of attitude from that of an extreme nationalist
to that of an extreme States-rights man was no doubt due in large
part to the influence of his friend and intimate Thomas Jefferson.
No two documents can be more dissimilar than the Virginia plan,
which would have invested Congress with a veto on State legislation,
and the famous Virginia Resolutions of 1789 and 1799, of which Mad-
ison was the author. However, his inconsistency was perhaps more
apparent than real; for having once given in his adhesion to the
Constitution, it was perfectly logical to desire a strict construction of
that instrument to preserve the balance struck in it between the
State and Federal governments.

On the inauguration of Jefferson as President in 1801, Madison
accepted the Secretaryship of State. It was while holding this office

JAMES MADISON

that he wrote the pamphlet (An Examination of the British Doctrine
which Subjects to Capture a Neutral Trade not Open in Time of
Peace. > At the close of Jefferson's second term, March 4th, 1809,
Madison became President. He had been to his predecessor an able
and efficient lieutenant. He was, however, a scholar rather than a
man of action; and it was his misfortune that his administration fell
in a period which required more than ordinary talents of leadership,
and those of a different stamp from his own. His conduct of the
War of 1812 was weak and hesitating, and added nothing to the glory
of his previous career. He retired at the expiration of his second
term in 1817 to Montpelier, his country seat in Virginia, where he
died June 28th, 1836.

FROM <THE FEDERALIST >
AN OBJECTION DRAWN FROM THE EXTENT OF COUNTRY ANSWERED

WE HAVE seen the necessity of the Union, as our bulwark
against foreign danger; as the conservator of peace among
ourselves; as the guardian of our commerce, and other
common interests; as the only substitute for those military estab-
lishments which have subverted the liberties of the Old World;
and as the proper antidote for the diseases of faction, which have
proved fatal to other popular governments, and of which alarm-
ing symptoms have been betrayed by our own. All that remains,
within this branch of our inquiries, is to take notice of an objec-
tion that may be drawn from the great extent of country which
the Union embraces. A few observations on this subject will be
the more proper, as it is perceived that the adversaries of the
new Constitution are availing themselves of a prevailing prejudice
with regard to the practicable sphere of republican administra-
tion, in order to supply, by imaginary difficulties, the want of
those solid objections which they endeavor in vain to find.

The error which limits republican government to a narrow
district has been unfolded and refuted in preceding papers. I
remark here only, that it seems to owe its rise and prevalence
chiefly to the confounding of a republic with a democracy, and
applying to the former, reasonings drawn from the nature of
the latter. The true distinction between these forms was also
adverted to on a former occasion. It is, that in a democracy the
people meet and exercise the government in person; in a repub-
lic they assemble and administer it by their representatives and

JAMES MADISON

agents. A democracy, consequently, must be confliiecl to a Small
spot. A republic may be extended over a large region.

To this accidental source of the error may be added the
artifice of some celebrated authors whose writings have had a
great share in forming the modern standard of political opinions.
Being subjects either of an absolute or limited monarchy, they
have endeavored to heighten the advantages or palliate the evils
of those forms, by placing in comparison with them the vices
and defects of the republican; and by citing, as specimens of the
latter, the turbulent democracies of ancient Greece and modern
Italy. Under the confusion of names, it has been an easy task
to transfer to a republic, observations applicable to a democracy
only; and among others, the observation that it can never be
established but among a small number of people, living within a
small compass of territory.

Such a fallacy may have been the less perceived, as most
of the popular governments of antiquity were of the democratic
species; and even in modern Europe, to which we owe the great
principle of representation, no example is seen of a government
wholly popular and founded at the same time wholly on that
principle. If Europe has the merit of discovering this great
mechanical power in government, by the simple agency of which
the will of the largest political body may be concentred, and its
force directed to any object which the public good requires,
America can claim the merit of making the discovery the basis
of unmixed and extensive republics. It is only to be lamented,
that any of her citizens should wish to deprive her of the addi-
tional merit of displaying its full efficacy in the establishment of
the comprehensive system now under her consideration.

As the natural limit of a democracy is that distance from the
central point which will just permit the most remote citizens to
assemble as often as their public functions demand, and will
include no greater number than can join in those functions, so
the natural limit of a republic is that distance from the centre
which will barely allow the representatives of the people to meet
as often as may be necessary for the administration of public
affairs. Can it be said that the limits of the United States ex-
ceed this distance ? It will not be said by those who recollect
that the Atlantic coast is the longest side of the Union ; that dur-
ing the term of thirteen years, the representatives of the States
have been almost continually assembled; and that the members

JAMES MADISON

from the most distant States are not chargeable with greater
intermissions of attendance than those from the States in the
neighborhood of Congress.

That we may form a juster estimate with regard to this inter-
esting subject, let us resort to the actual dimensions of the
Union. The limits, as fixed by the treaty of peace, are — on the
east the Atlantic, on the south the latitude of thirty-one degrees,
on the west the Mississippi, and on the north an irregular line
running in some instances beyond the forty-fifth degree, in oth-
ers falling as low as the forty-second. The southern shore of
Lake Erie lies below that latitude. Computing the distance be-
tween the thirty-first and forty-fifth degrees, it amounts to nine
hundred and seventy-three common miles; computing it from
thirty-one to forty-two degrees, to seven hundred and sixty-four
miles and a half. Taking the mean for the distance, the amount
will be eight hundred and sixty-eight miles and three fourths.
The mean distance from the Atlantic to the Mississippi does not
probably exceed seven hundred and fifty miles. On a comparison
of this extent with that of several countries in Europe, the prac-
ticability of rendering our system commensurate to it appears
to be demonstrable. It is not a great deal larger than Ger
many, where a diet representing the whole empire is continually
assembled; or than Poland before the late dismemberment, where
another national diet was the depository of the supreme power.
Passing by France and Spain, we find that in Great Britain,
inferior as it may be in size, the representatives of the northern
extremity of the island have as far to travel to the national
council as will be required of those of the most remote parts of
the Union.

Favorable as this view of the subject may be, some observa-
tions remain which will place it in a light still more satisfactory.

In the first place, it is to be remembered that the general
government is not to be charged with the whole power of mak-
ing and administering laws: its jurisdiction is limited to cer-
tain enumerated objects, which concern all the members of the
republic, but which are not to be attained by the separate pro-
visions of any. The subordinate governments, which can extend
their care to all those other objects which can be separately pro-
vided for, will retain their due authority and activity. Were it
proposed by the plan of the convention to abolish the govern-
ments of the particular States, its adversaries would have soms

JAMES MADISON

ground for their objection; though it would not be difficult to
show that if they were abolished, the general government would
be compelled, by the principle of self-preservation, to reinstate
them in their proper jurisdiction.

A second observation to be made is, that the immediate ob-
ject of the Federal Constitution is to secure the union of the
thirteen primitive States, which we know to be practicable; and
to add to them such other States as may arise in their own
bosoms, or in their neighborhoods, which we cannot doubt to
be equally practicable. The arrangements that may be neces-
sary for those angles and fractions of our territory which lie on
our northwestern frontier must be left to those whom further
discoveries and experience will render more equal to the task.

Let it be remarked, in the third place, that the intercourse
throughout the Union will be daily facilitated -by new improve-
ments. Roads will everywhere be shortened, and kept in bet-
ter order; accommodations for travelers will be multiplied and
meliorated; an interior navigation on our eastern side will be
opened throughout, or nearly throughout, the whole extent of the
thirteen States. The communication between the western and
Atlantic districts, and between different parts of each, will be
rendered more and more easy by those numerous canals with
which the beneficence of nature has intersected our country, and
which art finds it so little difficult to connect and complete.

A fourth and still more important consideration is, that as
almost every State will on one side or other be a frontier,
and will thus find, in a regard to its safety, an inducement to
make some sacrifices for the sake of general protection, so the
States which lie at the greatest distance from the heart of the
union, and which of course may partake least of the ordinary
circulation of its benefits, will be at the same time immediately
contiguous to foreign nations, and will consequently stand, on par-
.ticular occasions, in greatest need of its strength and resources.
It may be inconvenient for Georgia, or the States forming our
western or northeastern borders, to send their representatives to
the seat of government; but they would find it more so to strug-
gle alone against an invading enemy, or even to support alone
the whole expense of those precautions which may be dictated
by the neighborhood of continual danger. If they should derive
less benefit therefore from the union, in some respects, than the
less distant States, they will derive greater benefit from it in

JAMES MADISON

other respects; and thus the proper equilibrium will be main-
tained throughout.

I submit to you, my fellow-citizens, these considerations, in full
confidence that the good sense which has so often marked your
decisions will allow them their due weight and effect; and that
you will never suffer difficulties, however formidable in appear-
ance, or however fashionable the error on which they may be
founded, to drive you into the gloomy and perilous scenes into
which the advocates for disunion would conduct you. Hearken
not to the unnatural voice which tells you that the people of
America, knit together as they are by so many chords of affec-
tion, can no longer live together as members of the same fam-
ily; can no longer continue the mutual guardians of their mutual
happiness; can no longer be fellow-citizens of one great, respect-
able, and flourishing empire. Hearken not to the . voice which
petulantly tells you that the form of government recommended
for your adoption is a novelty in the political world; that it has
never yet had a place in the theories of the wildest projectors;
that it rashly attempts what it is impossible to accomplish. No,
my countrymen: shut your ears against this unhallowed language.
Shut your hearts against the poison which it conveys. The kin-
dred blood which flows in the veins of American citizens, the
mingled blood which they have shed in defense of their sacred
rights, consecrate their union, and excite horror at the idea of
their becoming aliens, rivals, enemies. And if novelties are to
be shunned, believe me, the most alarming of all novelties, the
most wild of all projects, the most rash of all attempts, is that
of rending us in pieces in order to preserve our liberties and
promote our happiness.

But why is the experiment of an extended republic to be
rejected, merely because it may comprise what is new ? Is it not
the glory of the people of America, that whilst they have paid a
decent regard to the opinions of former times and other nations,
they have not suffered a blind veneration for antiquity, for cus-
tom, or for names, to overrule the suggestions of their own
good sense, the knowledge of their own situation, and the les-
sons of their own experience? To this manly spirit, posterity will
be indebted for the possession, and the world for the example,
of the numerous, innovations displayed on the American thea-
tre in favor of private rights and public happiness. Had no
important step been taken by the leaders of the Revolution for

JAMES MADISON

which a precedent could- not be discovered, — no government
established of which an exact model did not present itself, — the
people of the United States might at this moment have been
numbered among the melancholy victims of misguided councils;
must at best have been laboring under the weight of some of
those forms which have crushed the liberties of the rest of man-
kind. Happily for America, — happily, we trust, for the whole
human race, — they pursued a new and more noble course. They
accomplished a revolution which has no parallel in the annals of
human society. They reared the fabrics of governments which
have no model on the face of the globe. They formed the
design of a great confederacy, which it is incumbent on their suc-
cessors to improve and perpetuate. If their works betray imper-
fections, we wonder at the fewness of them. If they erred most
in the structure of the union, this was the work most difficult to
be executed; this is the work which has been new modeled by
the act of your convention, and it is that act on which you are
now to deliberate and to decide.

INTERFERENCE TO QUELL DOMESTIC INSURRECTION
From <The Federalist >

AT FIRST view, it might seem not to square with the repub-
lican theory to suppose either that a majority have not the
right, or that a minority will have the force, to subvert a
government; and consequently, that the federal interposition can
never be required but when it would be improper. But theoretic
reasoning, in this as in most other cases, must be qualified by
the lessons- of practice. Why may not illicit combinations, for
purposes of violence, be formed as well by a majority of a State,
especially a small State, as by a majority of a county or a dis-
trict of the same State; and if the authority of the State ought
in the latter case to protect the local magistracy, ought not the
Federal authority, in the former, to support the State authority?
Besides, there are certain parts of the State constitutions which
are so interwoven with the federal Constitution, that a violent
blow cannot be given to the one without communicating the •
wound to the other. Insurrections in a State will rarely induce
a federal interposition, unless the number concerned in them
bear some proportion to the friends of government. It will be

JAMES MADISON

much better that the violence in such cases should be repressed
by the superintending power, than that the majority should be
left to maintain their cause by a bloody and obstinate contest.
The existence of a right to interpose will generally prevent the
necessity of exerting it.

Is it true that force and right are necessarily on the same side
in republican governments ? May not the minor party possess
such a superiority of pecuniary resources, of military talents and
experience, or of secret succors from foreign powers, as will ren-
der it superior also in an appeal to the sword? May not a more
compact and advantageous position turn the scale on the same
side, against a superior number so situated as to be less capable
of a prompt and collected exertion of its strength ? Nothing can
be more chimerical thrn to imagine that in a trial of actual force,
victory may be calculated by the rules which prevail in a census
of the inhabitants, or which determine the event of an election !
May it not happen, in fine, that the minority of citizens may
become a majority of persons, by the accession of alien residents,
of a casual concourse of adventurers, or of those whom the con-
stitution of the State has not admitted to the rights of suffrage ?
I take no notice of an unhappy species of population abounding in
some of the States, who, during the calm of regular government,
are sunk below the level of men; but who, in the tempestuous
scenes of civil violence, may emerge into the human character,
and give a superiority of strength to any party with which they
may associate themselves.

In cases where it may be doubtful on which side justice lies,
what better umpires could be desired by two violent factions, fly-
ing to arms and tearing a State to pieces, than the representatives
of confederate States not heated by the local flame? To the
impartiality of judges they would unite the affection of friends.
Happy would it be if such a remedy for its infirmities could be
enjoyed by all free governments; if a project equally effectual
could be established for the universal peace of mankind!

Should it be asked, what is to be the redress for an insurrec-
tion pervading all the States, and comprising a superiority of the
entire force, though not a constitutional right, — the answer must
be that such a case, as it would be without the compass of human
remedies, so it is fortunately not within the compass of human
probability; and that it is a sufficient recommendation of the
federal Constitution, that it diminishes the risk of a calamity for
which no possible constitution can provide a cure.

954i

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

(1864-)

BY WILLIAM SHARP

iNE of the most remarkable, one of the most widely known of
the younger writers of the day, Maurice Maeterlinck, is still
little more than a name to the majority of people, even
among those who nominally follow closely every new expression of
the contemporary spirit. Some, following the example of his ultra-
enthusiastic French pioneer, M. Octave Mirbeau, have made for him
the high claim of genius; others have gone
to the opposite extreme, and denied his pos-
session of any qualities save a morbid fan-
tasy in drama, or of a mystical intensity in
spiritual philosophy.

That Maurice Maeterlinck is in every
sense of the word a most notable person-
ality in contemporary literature is net to
be denied; whether we like or dislike his
peculiar methods in the dramatic presenta-
tion of his vision of life, or understand or
sympathize with his uncompromising posi-
tion as a mystic of the kindred of Sweden-
borg, Jakob Boehme, or that Ruysbroeck of
•whom he has been the modern interpreter.

It is undeniable, now, that the great vogue prophesied for the Maeter-
linckian drama has not been fulfilled. Possibly the day may come
when the Drame Intime may have a public following to justify the
hopes of those who believe in it; but that time has not come yet.
Meanwhile, we have to be content with dramas of the mind enacted
against mental tapestries, so to say, or with shifting backgrounds
among the dream vistas and perspectives of the mind. For although
several of M. Maeterlinck's poetic plays have been set upon the
stage, — rather as puppet plays than in the sense commonly meant, —
their success has been one of curiosity rather than of conviction.
Even the most impressive has seemed much less so when subjected
to the conditions of stage representation; and it is almost impossible
to understand how certain of them could avoid exciting that sense

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

9542 MAURICE MAETERLINCK

of incongruity which is fatal to a keen impression of verisimilitude.
Even compositions so decorative as (The Seven Princesses,* or that
strange drama 'The Blind,* are infinitely more impressive when read
than when seen; and this because they are, like all else of Mae-
terlinck's, merely the embodiment in words, and in a pseudo-dramatic
formula, of spiritual allegories or dreams. There were many who
thought that his short drama <The Intruder* more than stood the
test of stage representation. I have seen <L'Intruse) twice, and
given with all the skill and interpretative sympathy possible, both
in Paris and London; and yet I have not for a moment found in its
stage representation anything to approach the convincing and inti-
mate appeal, so simple and yet so subtle and weird, afforded in the
perusal of the original.

We have, however, no longer to consider Maurice Maeterlinck
merely as a dramatist, or perhaps I should say as a writer in dra-
matic form. He began as a poet, and as a writer of a very strange
piece of fiction; and now, and for some time past, his work has been
that of a spiritual interpreter, of an essayist, and of a mystic.

Mooris Materlinck — for it was not till he was of age that he
adopted the Gallicized <( Maurice Maeterlinck ** — was born in Flanders,
and is himself racially as well as mentally and spiritually a Fleming
of the Flemings. He has all the physical endurance, the rough bod-
ily type, of his countrymen; but he has also their quiet intensity of
feeling, their sense of dream and mystery. His earliest influences in
literature were French and English: the French of writers such as
Villiers de L'Isle-Adam, the English of writers such as Shakespeare
and the Elizabethan dramatists. When, as little more than a youth,
he went to Paris, it was mainly in the hope of discipleship to the
great Villiers. It was while in Paris that he wrote one of his earliest
and to this day one of his most remarkable productions, the short
story entitled <The Massacre of the Innocents, > — a study so remark-
able that it at once attracted the attention of the few who closely
follow every new manifestation of literary talent. In this strange
tale, Maeterlinck has attempted to depict the Biblical story after the
manner of those Dutch and Flemish painters who represented with
unflinching contemporary realism all their scenes based upon Script-
ural episodes — that is to say, who represented every scene, however
Oriental or remote, in accordance with Dutch or Flemish customs,
habits, dress, etc. This short story, however, appeared in an obscure
and long since defunct French periodical; and little notice was taken
of it till some years later, when the present writer drew attention 'to
it as the first production of its by that time distinguished author.
Since then it has been admirably translated, and has appeared in an
American edition.

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

But the first actual book which Maurice Maeterlinck published was
a volume of poems entitled c Serres Chaudes,' — a title which we
might idiomatically render as ( Hot-house Blooms. } These poems are
interesting, and we can clearly discern in them the same mental
outlook and habit of mind the author exhibits in his maturer prose
writings; but they have not in any marked degree the lyric quality,
as a poet's work must have; and for all that there are poetical and
imaginative lines and verses, they suggest rather the work of a rare
and imaginative mind controlling itself to expression in this manner,
than of one who yields to it out of imperious and impulsive need.
In some respects we find a curious return to this first book in Maeter-
linck's later work, ( Le Tresor des Humbles,) for although it is a
vohime of mystical essays, and deals with other themes than those
chiefly broached in ( Serres Chaudes,' there is a remarkable spiritual
affinity between them. It is impossible to understand this strange
and powerful writer if one does not approach him on his mystical
side. It is not necessary for the reader to follow him in his brooding
hours with Ruysbroeck, or even to listen to what he has to say
on the subject of Novalis and other German mystics; but his subtle
analytical study of Emerson, and above all, those spiritual essays of
his (entitled in English < The Treasure of the Humble )), should be
carefully studied. This last-named book has shared the fate of all
works of the kind; that is to say, it has been ignored by the great
majority of the reading public, it has been sneered at by an ever fret-
ful and supercilious band of critics, and has been received with deep
gladness and gratitude by the few who welcome with joy any true
glad tidings of the spiritual life. Among these essays, two should in
particular be read : those entitled ( The Deeper Life > and ( The Inner
Beauty.' The last-named, indeed, is really a quintessential essay.
Just as a certain monotony of detail characterizes Maeterlinck's dra-
mas, so a repetitive diffuseness mars these prose essays of his.
Beautiful thoughts and phrases are to be found throughout the whole
of <The Treasure of the Humble >; but after all, the essay entitled
( The Inner Beauty > comprises his whole spiritual philosophy. When
we turn to Maurice Maeterlinck the dramatist, we find him the
supreme voice in modern Belgian literature. As a poet he is far sur-
passed by Emile Verhaeren — who is indeed one of the finest poets
now living in any country; and as a writer of prose he has many
rivals, and some who have a distinction, grace, and power altogether
beyond what he has himself displayed. But as a dramatist — that is,
an imaginative artist working in dramatic form — he holds a unique
and altogether remarkable place.

In one of his early poems he exclaims: (<Mon ame! — Oh, mon
ante vraiment trop a 1'abri!" — (My soul! — Oh, truly my soul dwells

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

too* much in the shadow!) And it is this dwelling in the shadow
which is the dominant characteristic of Maurice Maeterlinck. In
(The Princess Maleine,' in ( The Seven Princesses, > in ( Pelleas and
Melisande,> in <The Intruder, > and < The Blind, >— in one and all
of these, to his latest production, he hardly ever moves out of the
shadow of a strange and affecting imaginative gloom. He too might
with the Spanish writer, Emilia Pardo Bazan, exclaim : (< Enter with
me into the dark zone of the human soul ! }) It is rather, with
him, the twilight zone. He loves to haunt the shadowy ways where
night and day concur, — those shadowy ways wherein human actions
and thoughts are still real, but are invested with a light or a shadow
either strange or fantastic. His method is a simple one; but it is
that kind of simplicity which involves a subtle and artistic mind.
Often he relies upon words as abstractions, in order to convey the
impression that is in his own mind; and this accounts for the bewil-
derment which some of his characteristic mannerisms cause to many
readers. Where they see simple repetition, a vain and perhaps child-
ish monotony, Maeterlinck is really endeavoring to emphasize the
impression he seeks to convey, by dwelling upon certain images,
accentuating certain words, evoking certain , mental melodies or
rhythms full of a certain subtle suggestion of their own.

Much has been said and written about this new form in con-
temporary dramatic literature. It is a form strangely seductive, if
obviously perilous. It has possibly a remarkable future — coming, as
it has done, at a time when our most eager spirits are solicitous of a
wider scope in expression, for a further opening-up of alluring vis-
tas through the ever blossoming wilderness of art. It may well be
that Maeterlinck's chief service here will prove rather to be that of
a pioneer — of a pioneer who has directed into new channels the
stream which threatened to stagnate in the shallows of insincere con-
vention.

Maeterlinck was guided to the formula with which his name has
become so identified, primarily through the influence of his friend
Charles van Lerberghe, the author of <Les Flaireurs.* The short
dramatic episode entitled < Les Flaireurs > occupies itself with a single
incident: the death of an old peasant woman, by night, in a lonely
cottage in a remote district, with no companion save her girlish
grandchild. Almost from the outset the reader guesses what the
nocturnal voices indicate. The ruse of the dramatist is almost child-
ishly simple, if its process of development be regarded in detail.
The impressiveness lies greatly in the cumulative effect. A night of
storm, the rain lashing at the windows, the appalling darkness with-
out, the wan candle-glow within, a terrified and- bewildered child, a
dying and delirious old woman, an ominous oft-repeated knocking at

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

9545

the door, a hoarse voice without, changeful but always menacing,
mocking or muttering an obscure and horrible message: this inter-
wrought, again and again represented, austerely tragic by-play — from
one point of view, merely the material for tragedy — is a profoundly
impressive work of art. It* is perhaps all the more so from the fact
that it relies to some extent upon certain venerable and even out-
worn conventionalities. The midnight hour, storm, mysterious sounds,
the howl of a dog — we are familiar with all these (< properties. }>
They do not now move us. Sheridan Le Fanu, or Fitzjames O'Brien,
or R. L. Stevenson, can create for us an inward terror far beyond
the half-simulated creep with which we read the conventional bogy-
story. That Charles van Lerberghe should so impress us by the
simplest and most familiar stage tricks points to his genuine artistry,
to his essential masterhood. The literary conjurer would fain deceive
us by sleight of hand; the literary artist persuades us by sleight of
mind.

Van Lerberghe is neither romanticist nor realist, as these vague
and often identical terms are understood abroad. He works realisti-
cally in the sphere of the imaginary. If it were not that his aim, as
that of Maeterlinck, is to bring into literature a new form of the drame
intime, with meanwhile the adventitious aid of nominal stage acces-
sories, one might almost think that ( Les Flaireurs > was meant for
stage representation. It would be impossible, however, thus. Imagine
the incongruity of the opening of this drama with its subject: —

<( Orchestral music. Funeral march. Roll of muffled drums. A blast of a
horn in the distance. Roll of drums. A short psalmodic motive for
the organ. REPEATED KNOCKS, HEAVY AND DULL. Curtain.^

What have orchestral music and rolling of drums, and a psalmodic
motive for the organ, to do with an old peasant woman dying in a
cottage ? For that stage of the imagination from which many of us
derive a keener pleasure than from that of any theatre, there is per-
haps nothing incongruous here. The effect sought to be produced is
a psychic one; and if produced, the end is gained, and the means of
no moment. It is only from this standpoint that we can view aright
the work of Van Lerberghe, Maeterlinck, and Auguste Jenart. <Les
Flaireurs } is wholly unsuitable for the actual stage, — as unsuitable as
(L'Intruse,> or <Les Aveugles,> or <Les Sept Princesses,' or < Le Bar-
bare. } Each needs to be enacted in the shadow-haunted glade of the
imagination, in order to be understood aright. Under the lime-light
• their terror becomes folly, their poetry rhetoric, their tragic signifi-
cance impotent commonplace; their atmosphere of mystery, the com-
mon air of the squalidly apparent; their impressiveness a cause of
mocking.

954<5

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

While in Maurice Maeterlinck we certainly encounter one of the
most interesting figures in contemporary letters, it is not so easy to
arrive at a definite opinion as to whether he is really a dominant
force.

There are many who believe that trie author of <La Princesse
Maleine> — and of many striking productions which have succeeded it
— will attain to that high mastery which makes a writer a voice for
all men, and not merely an arresting echo for his own hour, his own
time, among his own people. Certainly his debut was significant,
remarkable. Yet in France, where his reputation was made, he is
already looked upon as a waning force. Any new work by him is
regarded with interest, with appreciation and sympathy perhaps, but
not with that excited anticipation with which formerly it was greeted.
For ourselves, we cannot estimate him otherwise than by his actual
achievement. Has the author of (La Princesse Maleine,* 'L'Intruse,'
and < Les Aveugles y — his earliest and most discussed works — fulfilled
himself in <Pelleas et Melisande > and the successors of that mov-
ing drama? His admirers declared that in this last-named play we
should find him at his best and most mature. But (Pelleas and Meli-
sande) has not stood the test.

Yet I do not think (Pelleas et Melisande* is — what so many claim
for it — Maeterlinck's Sedan. All the same it is, at best, «a faithful
failure. w I believe he will give us still better work; work as dis-
tinctive as his two masterpieces, <L'Intruse> and <Les Aveugles, }
but with a wider range of sympathy, more genial an insight, an
apprehension and technical achievement more masterly still. Indeed,
in <Tintagiles) and his latest productions, he has to a large extent
fulfilled the wonderful imaginative beauty with which he charmed
us in ( Les Sept Princesses. } Still, even here it is rather the dream-
record of a dreamer than the actual outlook on life of a creative
mind.

Finally, what we have to bear in mind meanwhile is that Maurice
Maeterlinck is possibly the pioneer of a new method coming into
literature. We must not look too closely, whether in praise or blame,
to those treasured formulas of his, of which so much has been said.
What is inessential in these he will doubtless unlearn; what is essen-
tial he will probably develop. For it is not in the accidents of his
dramatic expression that so fine an artist as Maeterlinck is an origi-
nal writer, but in that quality of insight which is his own, that phras-
ing, that atmosphere.

CjUcCu.^

MAURICE MAETERLINCK 9546 a

EDITORIAL NOTE. — As William Sharp's death excluded the possi-
bility of the revision of the foregoing article by his own hand, it seemed
best to the Editors to leave it untouched, for it is an admirable presen-
tation of Maeterlinck's work up to the time that it was written. Sharp's
distrust of the permanent success of the mystical dramas, expressed
with- so much sympathy and insight, was later confirmed by the drama-
tist himself. Indeed Maeterlinck confounded some of his more en-
thusiastic disciples by speaking in tones of decided depreciation of
these earlier plays, and his dramatic work took an entirely new turn.
The change has been ascribed to his desire to write a play suited to the
talent of the charming and gifted actress, Georgette Leblanc, whom
he married in 1901, but it should doubtless be attributed to more
profound developments in his artistic and intellectual life. However
this may be, it is certain that ( Mona Vanna) (1902) offered a complete
contrast to his earlier dramatic work; instead of the vague background
of legendary northern forests, we have a definite scene — Pisa at the
end of the fifteenth century, — and instead of the drame intime of
humble souls or mystic princesses, we have the stirring incidents of a
siege and the clash of contending politicians. All this, it is true, is
interwoven with the spiritual struggles that take place in the hearts of
Mona Vanna, her husband, and her lover, but the drama in its tone
and atmosphere is much closer to Browning's (Luria,) to which it was
obviously indebted, than to anything its author had done before. As
a historical melodrama it was made effective enough on the American
stage by a talented emotional actress of the day, but it was necessary
for the critics to point out its spiritual significance, which was pre-
sumably the dramatist's chief aim, but which somehow disappeared
in the representation. »

Maeterlinck was hardly more successful in dealing with a subject
from Christian tradition, in (Sister Beatrice) (1901) or from Arthurian
legend in (Joyzelle) (1903), but in (The Blue Bird) (1908) he at last
found material exactly suited for dramatic treatment by him from the
point of view at which he had now arrived — that of the agnostic
mystic — who accepts the facts of science, but sees beyond them a
vast field for poetic imagination. First acted in Moscow, (The Blue
Bird) made its triumphant way all over Europe and across the Atlantic;
it is still perhaps the most popular of fairy plays, both with children,
who are delighted by its romantic treatment of matters of everyday
experience, and by adult critics, who find in it suggestions of deep
spiritual significance.

Before (The Blue Bird) achieved its world wide dramatic success
Maeterlinck had firmly established his reputation as a writer of prose
in (La Vie des Abeilles) (The Life of the Bee, 1901). It was not that
like Fabre he discovered new facts, but he gave to what was already
known a romantic charm due to an imaginative insight and a peculiarly

9546b MAURICE MAETERLINCK

attractive style, of which the following description of the queen bee's
nuptial flight may serve as an example:

((She starts her flight backwards; returns twice or thrice to the alighting-board;
and then, having definitely fixed in her mind the exact situation and aspect of the
kingdom she has never yet seen from without, she departs like an arrow to the
zenith of the blue. She soars to a height, a luminous zone, that other bees attain
at no period of their life. Far away, caressing their idleness in the midst of the
flowers, the males have beheld the apparition, have breathed the magnetic perfume
that spreads from group to group till every apiary near is instinct with it. Immedi-
ately crowds collect, and follow her into the sea of gladness, whose limpid boundaries
ever recede. She, drunk with her wings, obeying the magnificent law of the race
that chooses jier lover, and enacts that the strongest alone shall attain her in the
solitude of the ether, she rises still; and, for the first time in her life, the blue morning
air rushes into her stigmata, singing its song, like the blood of heaven, in the myriad
tubes of the tracheal sacs, nourished on space, that fill the centre of her body. She
rises still. A region must be found unhaunted by birds, that else might profane the
mystery. She rises still; and already the ill-assorted troop below are dwindling and
falling asunder. The feeble, infirm, the aged, unwelcome, ill-fed, who have flown
from inactive or impoverished cities, these renounce the pursuit and disappear in
the void. Only a small, indefatigable cluster remain, suspended in infinite opal.
She summons her wings for one final effort; and now the chosen of incomprehensible
forces has reached her, has seized her, and bounding aloft with united impetus, the
ascending spiral of their intertwined flight whirls for one second in the hostile madness
of love.))

Maeterlinck's genius next sought an outlet in discussions of psychical
phenomena, more especially in connection with the problem of the
immortality of the soul. His essays on the subject have his unfailing
charm of style, but are less readable on account of the uncongenial
material he has undertaken to handle. His philosophic discussions of
the general problem of immortality are marked by scientific reserve,
curiously combined with the native cheerfulness which goes with his
Flemish temperament and robust physique. He cannot be said to have
added anything to our knowledge of life beyond the grave, but he writes
about it sympathetically and courageously.

The outbreak of the war interrupted Maeterlinck's literary and
philosophic interest. Although he had long resided at the beautiful
Abbey of Ste. Wandrille in France he remained thoroughly Belgian at
heart, and he plunged with all the ardor of his passionate temperament
and the eloquence of his moving style into protests and pleas on behalf
of his unhappy compatriots. These belong perhaps rather to history
than to literature, but the unsparing devotion with which Maeter-
linck gave himself to the cause of his unfortunate country cannot but
command our admiration.

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

FROM <THE DEATH OF TINTAGILES>

9547

The Plays of Maurice Maeterlinck, Second Series. Translated by Richard
Hovey. Copyright 1896, by Stone & Kimball.

Scene: At the top of a hill overlooking the castle. Enter Ygraine, holding
Tintagiles by the hand.

YGRAINE — Thy first night will be troubled, Tintagiles. Already
the sea howls about us; and the trees are moaning. It is
late. The moon is just setting behind the poplars that stifle
the palace. We are alone, perhaps, for all that here we have to
live on guard. There seems to be a watch set for the approach
of the slightest happiness. I said to myself one day, in the very
depths of my soul, — and God himself could hardly hear it, — I
said to myself one day I should be happy. There needed noth-
ing further: in a little while our old father died, and both our
brothers vanished without a single human being able since to tell
us where they are. Now I am all alone, with my poor sister and
thee, my little Tintagiles; and I have no faith in the future.
Come here; sit on my knee. Kiss me first: and put thy little
arms there, all the way around my neck; perhaps they will not
be able to undo them. Rememberest thou the time when it was
I that carried thee at night when bedtime came; and when thou
fearedst the shadows of my lamp in the long windowless corri-
dors ? — I felt my soul tremble upon my lips when I saw thee,
suddenly, this morning. I thought thee so far away, and so
secure. Who was it made thee come here ?

Tintagiles — I do not know, little sister.

Ygraine — Thou dost not know any longer what was said ?

Tintagiles — They said I had to leave.

Ygraine — But why hadst thou to leave?

Tintagiles — Because it was the Queen's will.

Ygraine — They did not say why it was her will? — I am sure
they said many things.

Tintagiles — I heard nothing, little sister.

Ygraine — When they spoke among themselves, what did they
say ?

Tintagiles — They spoke in a low voice, little sister.

Ygraine — All the time?

Tintagiles — All the time, sister Ygraine; except when they
looked at me.

Ygraine — They did not speak of the Queen?

9548

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

Tintagiles — They said she was never seen, sister Ygraine.

Ygraine — And those who were with thee, on the bridge of
the ship, said nothing?

Tintagiles — They minded nothing but the wind and the sails,
sister Ygraine.

Ygraine — Ah! that does not astonish me, my child.

Tintagiles — They left me all alone, little sister.

Ygraine — Listen, Tintagiles, I will tell thee what I know.

Tintagiles — What dost thou know, sister Ygraine?

Ygraine — Not much, my child. My sister and I have crept
along here, since our birth, without daring to understand a whit
of all that happens. For a long while, indeed, I lived like a blind
woman on this island; and it all seemed natural to me. I saw
no other events than the flying of a bird, the trembling of a leaf,
the opening of a rose. There reigned such a silence that the
falling of a ripe fruit in the park called faces to the windows.
And no one seemed to have the least suspicion; but one night
I learned there must be something else. I would have fled, and
could not. Hast thou understood what I have said ?

Tintagiles — Yes, yes, little sister: I understand whatever you
will.

Ygraine — Well, then, let us speak no more of things that are
not known. Thou seest yonder, behind the dead trees that poison
the horizon — thou seest the castle yonder, in the depth of the
valley ?

Tintagiles — That which is so black, sister Ygraine?

Ygraine — It is black indeed. It is at the very depth of an
amphitheatre of shadows. We have to live there. It might have
been built on the summit of the great mountains that surround
it. The mountains are blue all day. We should have breathed.
We should have seen the sea and the meadows on the other side
of the* rocks. But they preferred to put it in the depth of the
valley; and the very air does not go down .so low. It is falling
in ruins, and nobody bewares. The walls are cracking; you
would say it was dissolving in the shadows. There is only one
tower unassailed by the weather. It is enormous; and the house
never comes out of its shadow.

Tintagiles — There is something shining, sister Ygraine. See,
see, the great red windows!

Ygraine — They are those of the tower, Tintagiles: they are
the only ones where you will see light; it is there the throne of
the Queen is set.

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

9549

Tintagiles — I shall not see the Queen?

Ygraine — No one can see her.

Tintagiles — Why can't one see her?

Ygraine — Come nearer, Tintagiles. Not a bird nor a blade of
grass must hear us.

Tintagiles — There is no grass, little sister. [A silence.'] —
What does the Queen do ?

Ygraine — No one knows, my child. She does not show her-
self. She lives there, all alone in her tower; and they that serve
her do not go out by day. She is very old; she is the mother
of our mother; and she would reign alone. She is jealous and
.suspicious, and they say that she is mad. She fears lest some one
rise into her place, and it was doubtless because of that fear that
she had thee brought hither. Her orders are carried out no one
knows how. She never comes down; and all the doors of the
tower are closed night and day. I aever caught a glimpse of
her; but others have seen her, it seems, in the past, when she
was young.

Tintagiles — Is she very ugly, sister Ygraine?

Ygraine — They say she is not beautiful, and that she is grow-
ing huge. But they that have seen her dare never speak of it.
Who knows, indeed, if they have seen her? She has a power not
to be understood ; and we live here with a great unpitying weight
upon our souls. Thou must not be frightened beyond measure,
nor have bad dreams; we shall watch over thee, my little Tinta-
giles, and no evil will be able to reach thee: but do not go far
from me, your sister Bellangere, nor our old master Aglovale.

Tintagiles — Not from Aglovale either, sister Ygraine?

Ygraine — Not from Aglovale either. He loves us.

Tintagiles — He is so old, little sister!

Ygraine — He is old, but very wise. He is the only friend
we have left; and he knows many things. It is strange; she has
made thee come hither without letting any one know. I do not
know what there is in my heart. I was sorry and glad to know
thou wert so far away, beyond the sea. And now — I was aston-
ished. I went out this morning to see if the sun was rising over
the mountains; and it is thou I see upon the threshold. I knew
thee at once.

Tintagiles — No, no, little sister: it was I that laughed first.

Ygraine — I could not laugh at once. Thou wilt understand.
It is time, Tintagiles, and the wind is growing black upon the

9550 MAURICE MAETERLINCK

sea. Kiss me harder, again, again, before thou standest upright.
Thou knowest not how we love. Give me thy little hand. I
shall guard it well; and we will go back into the sickening castle.

\Exeunt.

Scene: An apartment in the castle. Agio vale and Ygraine discovered.
Enter Bellangere.

Be Hanger e — Where is Tintagiles ?

Ygraine — Here; do not speak too loud. He sleeps in the
other room. He seems a little pale, a little ailing too. He was
tired by the journey and the long sea-voyage. Or else the atmo-,
sphere of the castle has startled his little soul. He cried for no
cause. I rocked him to sleep on my knees; come, see. He sleeps
in our bed. He sleeps very gravely, with one hand on his fore-
head, like a little sad king.

Bellangere [bursting suddenly into tears\ — My sister ! my sis-
ter ! my poor sister !

Ygraine — What is the matter?

Bellangere — I dare not say what I know, and I am not sure
that I know anything, and yet I heard that which one could not
hear —

Ygraine — What didst thou hear?

Bellangere — I was passing near the corridors of the tower —

Ygraine — Ah !

Bellangere — A door there was ajar. I pushed it very softly.
I went in.

Ygraine — In where ?

Bellangere — I had never seen the place. There were other
corridors lighted with lamps; then low galleries that had no out-
let. I knew it was forbidden to go on. I was afraid, and I was
going to return upon my steps, when I heard a sound of voices
one could hardly hear.

Ygraine — It must have been the handmaids of the Queen:
they dwell at the foot of the tower.

Bellangere — I do not know just what it was. There must
have been more than one door between us; and the voices came
to me like the voice of some one who was being smothered. I
drew as near as I could. I am not sure of anything, but I think
they spoke of a child that came t;o-day and of a crown of gold.
They seemed to be laughing.

MAURICE' MAETERLINCK

Ygraine — They laughed >

Bellangere — Yes, I think they laughed, unless they were
weeping, or unless it was something I did not understand; for it
was hard to hear, and their voices were sweet. They seemed to
echo in a crowd under the arches. They spoke of the child the
Queen would see. They will probably come up this evening.

Ygraine — What ? this evening?

Bellangere — Yes, yes, I think so.

Ygraine — They spoke no one's name?

Bellangere — They 'spoke of a child, of a very little child.

Ygraine — There is no other child.

Bellangere — They raised their voices a little at that moment,
because one of them had said the day seemed not yet come.

Ygraine — I know what that means; it is not the first time
they have issued from the tower. I knew well why she made
him come ; but I could not believe she would hasten so ! We
shall see; we are three, and we have time.

Bellangere — What wilt thou do ?

Ygraine — I do not know yet what I shall do, but I will aston-
ish her. Do you know how you tremble ? I will tell you —

Bellangere — What ?

Ygraine — She shall not take him without trouble.

Bellangere — We are alone, sister Ygraine.

Ygraine — Ah! it is true, we are alone! There is but one
remedy, the one with which we have always succeeded! Let us
wait upon our knees as the other times. Perhaps she will have
pity! She allows herself to be disarmed by tears. We must
grant her all she asks us; haply she will smile; and she is wont
to spare all those who kneel. She has been there for years in
her huge tower, devouring our beloved, and none, not one, has
dared to strike her in • the face. She is there, upon our souls,
like the stone of a tomb, and no one dare put forth his arm. In
the time when there were men here, they feared too, and fell
upon their faces. To-day it is the woman's turn: we shall see.
It is time to rise at last. We know not upon what her power
rests, and I will live no longer in the shadow of her tower. Go —
go, both of you, and leave me more alone still, if you tremble
too. I shall await her.

Bellangere — Sister, I do not know what must be done; but I
stay with thee.

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

Aglovale — I too stay, my daughter. For a long- time my soul
has been restless. You are going to try. We have tried more
than once.

Ygraine — You have tried — you too?

Aglovale — They have all tried. But at the last moment they
have lost their strength. You will see, you too. Should she order
me to come up to her this very night, I should clasp both my
hands without a word; and my tired feet would climb the stair,
without delay and without haste, well as I know no one comes
down again with open eyes. I have no more courage against
her. Our hands are of no use and reach no one. They are not
the hands we need, and all is useless. But I would help you,
because you hope. Shut the doors, my child. Wake Tintagiles;
encircle him with your little naked arms and take him on your
knees. We have no other defense.

THE INNER BEAUTY
From <The Treasure of the Humble >

THERE is nothing in the whole world that can vie with the
soul in its eagerness for beauty, or in the ready power
wherewith it adopts beauty unto itself. There is nothing
in the world capable of such spontaneous uplifting, of such
speedy ennoblement; nothing that offers more scrupulous obedi-
ence to the pure and noble commands it receives. There is
nothing in the world that yields deeper submission to the empire
of a thought that is loftier than other thoughts. And on this
earth of ours there are but few souls that can withstand the
dominion of the soul that has suffered itself to become beautiful.
In all truth might it be said that beauty is the unique ali-
ment of our soul; for in all places does it search for beauty, and
it perishes not of hunger even in the most degraded of .lives.
For indeed nothing of beauty can pass by and be altogether
unperceived. Perhaps does it never pass by save only in our
unconsciousness: but its action is no less puissant in gloom of
night than by light of day; the joy it procures may be less tan-
gible, but other difference there is none. Look at the most ordi-
nary of men, at a time when a little beauty has contrived to
steal into their darkness. They have come together, it matters

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

not where, and for no special reason; but no sooner are they
assembled than their very first thought would seem to be to
close the great doors of life. Yet has each one of them, when
alone, more than once lived in accord with his soul. He has
loved perhaps, of a surety he has suffered. Inevitably must he
too have heard the (< sounds that come from the distant country
of Splendor and Terror }> ; and many an evening has he bowed
down in silence before laws that are deeper than the sea. And
yet when these men are assembled, it is with the basest of
things that they love to debauch themselves. They have a strange
indescribable fear of beauty; and as their number increases, so
does this fear become greater, resembling indeed their dread of
silence or of a verity that is too pure. And so true is this, that
were one of them to have done something heroic in the course
of the day, he would ascribe wretched motives to his conduct,
thereby endeavoring to find excuses for it, and these motives
would lie readily to his hand in that lower region where he and
his fellows were assembled. And yet listen: a proud and lofty
word has been spoken, a word that has in a measure undammed
the springs of life. For one instant has a soul dared to reveal
itself, even such as it is in love and sorrow, such as it is in face
of death and in the solitude that dwells around the stars of
night. Disquiet prevails; on some faces there is astonishment,
others smile. But have you never felt at moments such as those
how unanimous is the fervor wherewith every soul admires,
and how unspeakably even the very feeblest, from the remotest
depths of its dungeon, approves the word it has recognized as
akin to itself ? For they have all suddenly sprung to life again in
the primitive and normal atmosphere that is their own ; and could
you but hearken with angels' ears, I doubt not but you would
hear mightiest applause in that kingdom of amazing radiance
wherein the souls do dwell. Do you not think that even the
most timid of them would take courage unto themselves were
but similar words to be spoken every evening ? Do you not
think that men would live purer lives ? And yet though the
word come not again, still will something momentous have hap-
pened, that must leave still more momentous trace behind.
Every evening will its sisters recognize the soul that pronounced
the word; and henceforth, be the conversation never so trivial,
its mere presence will, I know not how, add thereto something of
majesty. Whatever else betide, there has been a change that we

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

cannot determine. No longer will such absolute power be vested
in the baser side of things, and henceforth even the most terror-
stricken of souls will know that there is somewhere a place of
refuge.

Certain it is that the natural and primitive relationship of
soul to soul is a relationship of beauty. For beauty is the only
language of our soul; none other is known to it. It has no other
life, it can produce nothing else, in nothing else can it take in-
terest. And therefore it is that the most oppressed, nay, the
most degraded of souls, — if it may truly be said that a soul can
be degraded, — immediately hail with acclamation every thought,
every word or deed, that is great and beautiful. Beauty is the
only element wherewith the soul is organically connected, and it
has no other standard or judgment. This is brought home to us
at every moment of our life, and is no less evident to the man by
whom beauty may more than once have been denied, than to him
who is ever seeking it in his heart. Should a day come when
you stand in profoundest need of another's sympathy, would you
go to him who was wont to greet the .passage of beauty with a
sneering smile ? Would you go to him whose shake of the head
had sullied a generous action or a mere impulse that was pure ?
Even though perhaps you had been of those who commended him,
you would none the less, when it was truth that knocked at your
door, turn to the man who had known how to prostrate himself
and love. In its very depths had your soul passed its judgment;
and it is this silent and unerring judgment that will rise to the
surface, after thirty years perhaps, and send you towards a sister
who shall be more truly you than you are yourself, for that she
has been nearer to beauty.

There needs but so little to encourage beauty in our soul; so
little to awaken the slumbering angels; or perhaps is there no
need of awakening, — it is enough that we lull them not to sleep.
It requires more effort to fall, perhaps, than to rise. Can we,
without putting constraint upon ourselves, confine our thoughts
to every-day things at times when the sea stretches before us and
we are face to face with the night ? And what soul is there but
knows that it is ever confronting the sea, ever in presence of an
eternal night ? Did we but dread beauty less, it would come
about that naught else in life would be visible; for in reality it
is beauty that underlies everything, it is beauty alone that exists.
There is no soul but is conscious of this; none that is not in

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

9555

readiness; but where are those that hide not their beauty? And
yet must one of them (< begin." Why not dare to be the one to
(< begin }> ? The others are all watching eagerly around us like
little children in front of a marvelous palace.. They press upon
the threshold, whispering to each other and peering through
every crevice; but there is not one who dares put his shoulder
to the door. They are all waiting for some grown-up person
to come and fling it open. But hardly ever does such a one
pass by.

And yet what is needed to become the grown-up person for
whom they lie in wait ? So little ! The soul is not exacting. A
thought that is almost beautiful — a thought that you speak not,
but that you cherish within you at this moment — will irradiate
you as though you were a transparent vase. They will see it,
and their greeting to you will be very different than had you
been meditating how best to deceive your brother. We are sur-
prised when certain men tell us that they have never come
across real ugliness, that they cannot conceive that a soul can be
base. Yet need there be no cause for surprise. These men had
"begun." They themselves had been the first to be beautiful,
and had therefore attracted all the beauty that passed by, as a
light-house attracts the vessels from the four corners of the hori-
zon. Some there are who complain of women, lor instance;
never dreaming that the first time a man meets a woman, a sin-
gle word or thought that denies tfce beautiful or profound will
be enough to poison forever his existence in her soul. (< For my
part, )} said a sage to me one day, <( I have never come across
a single woman who did not bring to me something that was
great. }> He was great himself first of all; therein lay his secret.
There is one thing only that the soul can never forgive: it is to
have been compelled to behold, or share, or pass close to an ugly
action, word, or thought. It cannot forgive, for forgiveness here
were but the denial of itself. And yet with the generality of
men, ingenuity, strength, and skill do but imply that the soul
must first of all be banished from their life, and that every im-
pulse that lies too deep must be carefully brushed aside. Even
in love do they act thus; and therefore it is that the woman,
who is so much nearer the truth, can scarcely ever live a mo-
ment of the true life with them. It is as though men dreaded
the contact of their soul, and were anxious to keep its beauty
at immeasurable distance. Whereas, on the contrary, we should

9556

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

endeavor to move in advance of ourselves. If at this moment
you think or say something that is too beautiful to be true in
you — if you have but endeavored to think or say it to-day, on
the morrow it will be true. We must try to be more beautiful
than ourselves; we shall never distance our soul. We can never
err when it is question of silent or hidden beauty. Besides,
so long- as the spring within us be limpid, it matters but little
whether error there be or not. But do any of us ever dream
of making the slightest unseen effort? And yet in the domain
where we are, everything is effective; for that, everything is
waiting. All the doors are unlocked; we have but to push them
open, and the palace is full of manacled queens. A single word
will very often suffice to clear the mountain of refuse. Why not
have the courage to meet a base question with a noble answer ?
Do you imagine it would pass quite unnoticed, or merely arouse
surprise ? Do you not think it would be more akin to the dis-
course that would naturally be held between two souls ? We
know not where it may give encouragement, where freedom.
Even he who rejects your words will in spite of himself have
taken a step towards the beauty that is within him. Nothing of
beauty dies without having purified something, nor can aught of
beauty be lost. Let us not be afraid of sowing it along the
road. It may remain there for weeks or years: but like the dia-
mond, it cannot dissolve, and finally there will pass by some one
whom its glitter will attract ; .he will pick it up and go his way
rejoicing. Then why keep back a lofty, beautiful word, for that
you doubt whether others will understand ? An instant of higher
goodness was impending over you: why hinder its coming, even
though you believe not that those about you will profit thereby ?
What if you are among men of the valley: is that sufficient rea-
son for checking the instinctive movement of your soul towards
the mountain peaks? Does darkness rob deep feeling of its
power ? Have the blind naught but their eyes wherewith to dis-
tinguish those who love them from those who love them not?
Can the beauty not exist that is not understood ? and is there not
in every man something that does understand, in regions far
beyond what he seems to understand, — far beyond, too, what he
believes he understands ? <( Even to the very wretchedest of all, >}
said to me one day the loftiest-minded creature it has ever been
my happiness to know, — <( even to the Very wretchedest of all, I
never have the courage to say anything in reply that is ugly or

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

9557

mediocre. }> I have for a long time followed that man's life,
and have seen the inexplicable power he exercised over the most
obscure, the most unapproachable, the blindest, even the most
rebellious of souls. For no tongue can tell the power of a soul
that strives to live in an atmosphere of beauty, and is actively
beautiful in itself. And indeed, is it not the quality of this activ-
ity that renders a life either miserable or divine ?

If we could but probe to the root of things, it might well
be discovered that it is by the strength of some souls that are
beautiful that others are sustained in life. Is it not the idea we
each form of certain chosen ones that constitutes the only living,
effective morality ? But in this idea how much is there of the
soul that is chosen, how much of him who chooses ? Do not
these things blend very mysteriously, and does not this ideal
morality lie infinitely deeper than the morality of the most beau-
tiful books ? A far-reaching influence exists therein whose limits
it is indeed difficult to define, and a fountain of strength whereat
we all of us drink many times a day. Would not any weakness
in one of those creatures whom you thought perfect, and loved in
the region of beauty, at once lessen your confidence in the uni-
versal greatness of things, and would your admiration for them
not suffer?

And again, I doubt whether anything in the world can beau-
tify a soul more spontaneously, more naturally, than the knowl-
edge that somewhere in its neighborhood there exists a pure and
noble being whom it can unreservedly love. When the soul has
veritably drawn near to such a being, beauty is no longer a
lovely, lifeless thing that one exhibits to the stranger; for it sud-
denly takes unto itself an imperious existence, and its activity
becomes so natural as to be henceforth irresistible. Wherefore
you will do well to think it over; for none are alone, and those
who are good must watch.

Plotinus, in the eighth book of the fifth 'Ennead,* after
speaking of the beauty that is <( intelligible, >J — /. ^., Divine, —
concludes thus: (<As regards ourselves, we are beautiful when we
belong to ourselves, and ugly when we lower ourselves to our
inferior nature. Also are we beautiful when we know ourselves,
and ugly when we have no such knowledge. >} Bear it in mind,
however, that here we are on the mountains, where not to know
oneself means far more than mere ignorance of what takes place
within us at moments of jealousy or love, fear or envy, happiness

9558

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

or unhappiness. Here not to know oneself means to be uncon-
scious of all the divine that throbs in man. As we wander from
the gods within us, so does ugliness enwrap us; as we discover
them, so do we become more beautiful. But it is only by re-
vealing the divine that is in us that we may discover the divine
in others. Needs must one god beckon to another; and no signal
is so imperceptible but they will every one of them respond. It
cannot be said too often, that be the crevice never so small, it
will yet suffice for all the waters of heaven to pour into our
soul. Every cup is stretched out to the unknown spring, and we
are in a region where none think of aught but beauty. If we
could ask of an angel what it is that our souls do in the shadow,
I believe the angel would answer, after having looked for many
years perhaps, and seen far more than the things the soul seems
to do in the eyes of men, <(They transform into beauty all the
little things that are given to them." AhJ we must admit that
the human soul is possessed of singular courage! Resignedly
does it labor, its whole life long, in the darkness whither most
of us relegate it, where it is spoken to by none. There, never
complaining, does it do all that in its power lies, striving to tear
from out the pebbles we fling to it the nucleus of eternal light
that perad venture they contain. And in the midst of its work it
is ever lying in wait for the moment when it may show to a sis-
ter who is more tenderly cared for, or who chances to be nearer,
the treasures it has so toilfully amassed. But thousands of exist-
ences there are that no sister visits; thousands of existences
wherein life has infused such timidity into the soul that it de-
parts without saying a word, without even once having been able
to deck itself with the humblest jewels of its humble crown.

And yet, in spite of all, does it watch over everything from
out its invisible heaven. It warns and loves, it admires, attracts,
repels. At every fresh event does it rise to the surface, where it
lingers till it be thrust down again, being looked upon as weari-
some and insane. It wanders to and fro, like Cassandra at the
gates of the Atrides. It is ever giving utterance to words of
shadowy truth, but there are none to listen. When we raise our
eyes, it yearns for a ray of sun or star that it may weave into a
thought, or haply an impulse, which shall be unconscious and
very pure. And if our eyes bring it nothing, still will it know
how to turn its pitiful disillusion into something ineffable, that
it will conceal even till its death. When we love, how eagerly

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

does it drink in the light from behind the closed door! — keen
with expectation, it yet wastes not a minute, and the light that
steals through the apertures becomes beauty and truth to the
soul. But if the door open not, (and how many lives are there
wherein it does open ?) it will go back into its prison, and its
regret will perhaps be a loftier verity that shall never be -seen; —
for we are now in the region of transformations whereof none
may speak; and though nothing born this side of the door can
be lost, yet does it never mingle with our life.

I said just now that the soul changed into beauty the little
things we gave to it. It would even seem, the more we think of
it, that the soul has no other reason for existence, and that all its
activity is consumed in amassing, at the depths of us, a treasure
of indescribable beauty. Might not everything naturally turn into
beauty were we not unceasingly interrupting the arduous labors
of our soul ? Does not evil itself become precious so soon as it
has gathered therefrom the deep-lying diamond of repentance ?
The acts of injustice whereof you have been guilty, the tears you
have caused to flow, will not these end too by becoming so much
radiance and love in your soul ? Have you ever cast your eyes
into this kingdom of purifying flame that is within you ? Per-
haps a great wrong may have been done you to-day, the act
itself being mean and disheartening, the mode of action of the
basest, and ugliness wrapped you round as your tears fell. But
let some years elapse, — then give one look into your soul, and
tell me whether, beneath the recollection of that act, you see not
something that is already purer than thought: an indescribable,
unnamable force that has naught in common with the forces of
this world; a mysterious inexhaustible spring of the other life,
whereat you may drink for the rest of your days. And yet will
you have rendered no assistance to the untiring queen; other
thoughts will have filled your mind, and it will be without your
knowledge that the act will have been purified in the silence of
your being, and will have flown into the precious waters that lie
in the great reservoir of truth and beauty, which, unlike the
shallower reservoir of true or beautiful thoughts, has an ever
ruffled surface, and remains for all time out of reach of the
breath of life. Emerson tells us that there is not an act or
event in our life but sooner or later casts off its outer shell, and
bewilders us by its sudden flight, from the very depths of us, on
high into the empyrean. And this is true to a far greater extent

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

than Emerson had foreseen; for the further we advance in these
regions, the diviner are the spheres we discover.

We can form no adequate conception of what this silent activ-
ity of the souls that surround us may really mean. Perhaps yov
have spoken a pure word to one of your fellows, by whom it has
not been understood. You look upon it as lost, and dismiss it
from your mind. But one day, peradventure, the word comes up
again extraordinarily transformed, and revealing the unexpected
fruit it has borne in the darkness; then silence once more falls
over all. But it matters not; we have learned that nothing can
be lost in the soul, and that even to the very pettiest there
come moments of splendor. It is unmistakably borne home to
us that even the unhappiest and the most destitute of men
have at the depths of their being, and in spite of themselves, a
treasure of beauty that they cannot despoil. They have but to
acquire the habit of dipping into this treasure. It suffices not
that beauty should keep solitary festival in life; it has to become
a festival of every day. There needs no great effort to be ad-
mitted into the ranks of those <( whose, eyes no longer behold
earth in flower, and sky in glory, in infinitesimal fragments, but
indeed in sublime masses w; — and I speak here of flowers and
sky that are purer and more lasting than those that we behold.
Thousands of channels there are through which the beauty of
our soul may sail even unto our thoughts. Above all is there
the wonderful central channel of love.

Is it not in love that are found the purest elements of beauty
that we can offer to the soul ? Some there are who do thus in
beauty love each other. And to love thus means that, little by
little, the sense of ugliness is lost; that one's eyes are closed to
all the littlenesses of life, to all but the freshness and virginity
of the very humblest of souls. Loving thus, we have no longer
even the need to forgive. Loving thus, we can no longer have
anything to conceal, for that the ever present soul transforms all
things into beauty. It is to behold evil in so far only as it puri-
fies indulgence, and teaches us no longer to confound the sinner
with his sin. Loving thus, do we raise on high within ourselves
all those about us who have attained an eminence where failure
has become impossible; heights whence a paltry action has so
far to fall, that touching earth it is compelled to yield up its
diamond soul. It is to transform, though all unconsciously, the
feeblest intention that hovers about us into illimitable movement

MAURICE MAETERLINCK 956r

It is to summon all that is beautiful in earth, heaven, or soul,
to the banquet of love. Loving thus, we do indeed exist before
our fellows as we exist before God. It means that the least
gesture will call forth the presence of the soul with all its treas-
ure. No longer is there need of death, disaster, or tears, for that
the soul shall appear: a smile suffices. Loving thus, we perceive
truth in happiness as profoundly as some of the heroes perceived
it in the radiance of greatest sorrow. It means that the beauty
that turns into love is undistinguishable from the love that turns
into beauty. It means to be able no longer to tell where the
ray of a star leaves off and the kiss of an ordinary thought be-
gins. It means to have come so near to God that the angels
possess us. Loving thus, the same soul -will have been so beau-
tified by us all that it will become little by little the <( unique
angel >} mentioned by Swedenborg. It means that each day will
reveal to us a new beauty in that mysterious angel, and that we
shall walk together in a goodness that shall ever become more
and more living, loftier and loftier. For there exists also a life-
less beauty made up of the past alone; but the veritable love
renders the past useless, and its approach creates a boundless
future of goodness, without disaster and without tears. To love
thus is but to free one's soul, and to become as beautiful as the
soul thus freed. (( If, in the emotion that this spectacle cannot
fail to awaken in thee," says the great Plotinus, when dealing
with kindred matters, — and of all the intellects known to me,
that of Plotinus draws the nearest to the divine, — <(if, in the
emotion that this spectacle cannot fail to awaken in thee, thou
proclaimest not that it is beautiful ; and if, plunging thine eyes
into thyself, thou dost not then feel the charm of beauty, — it
is in vain that, thy disposition being such, thou shouldst seek
the intelligible beauty; for thou wouldst seek it only with that
which is ugly and impure. Therefore it is that the discourse we
hold here is not addressed to all men. But if thou hast recog-
nized beauty within thyself, see that thou rise to the recollection
of the intelligible beauty. }>

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

FROM <THE TRAGICAL IN DAILY LIFE>
In <The Treasure of the Humble >

THERE is a tragic element in the life of every day that is far
more real, far more penetrating, far more akin to the true
self that is in us than the tragedy that lies in great ad-
venture. . . .

Is it beyond the mark to say that the true tragic element, nor-
mal, deep-rooted, and universal, — that the true tragic element of
life only begins at the moment when so-called adventures, sor-
rows, and dangers have disappeared ? Is the arm of happiness
not longer than that of sorrow, and do not certain of its attri-
butes draw nearer to the soul ? Must we indeed roar like the
Atridae, before the Eternal God will reveal himself in our life ?
and is he never by our side at times when the air is calm, and
the lamp burns on unflickering? . . . Are there not ele-
ments of deeper gravity and stability in happiness, in a single
moment of repose, than in the whirlwind of passion ? Is it not
then that we at last behold the march of time — ay, and of many
another on-stealing besides, more secret still — is it not then that
the hours rush forward ? Are not deeper chords set vibrating
by all these things than by the dagger-stroke of conventional
drama ? Is it not at the very moment when a man believes him-
self secure from bodily death that the strange and silent tragedy
of the being and the immensities does indeed raise its curtain on
the stage ? Is it while I flee before a naked sword that my
existence touches its most interesting point ? Is life always at
its sublimest in a kiss ? Are there not other moments, when one
hears purer voices that do not fade away so soon ? Does the
soul only flower on nights of storm ? Hitherto, doubtless, this
belief has prevailed. It is only the life of violence, the life of
bygone days, that is perceived by nearly all our tragic writers;
and truly may one say that anachronism dominates the stage,
and that dramatic art dates back as many years as the art of
sculpture. . . .

To the tragic author, as to the mediocre painter who still
lingers over historical pictures, it is only the 'violence of the
anecdote that appeals; and in his representation thereof does the
entire interest of his work consist. And he imagines, forsooth,
that we shall delight in witnessing the very same acts that

MAURICE MAETERLINCK

9563

brought joy to the hearts of the barbarians, with whom murder,
outrage, and treachery were matters of daily occurrence. Where-
as it is far away from bloodshed, battle-cry, and sword-thrust
that the lives of most of us flow on; and men's tears are silent
to-day, and invisible, and almost spiritual.

Indeed, when I go to a theatre, I feel as though I were
spending a few hours with my ancestors, who conceived life as
something that was primitive, arid, and brutal; but this concep-
tion of theirs scarcely even lingers in my memory, and surely it
is not one that I can share. I am shown a deceived husband
killing his wife, a woman poisoning her lover, a son avenging
his father, a father slaughtering his children, children putting
their father to death, murdered kings, ravished virgins, impris-
oned citizens — in a word, all the sublimity of tradition, but alas,
how superficial and material ! Blood, surface-tears, and death !
What can I ' learn from creatures who have but one fixed idea,
and who have no time to live, for that there is a rival, or a
mistress, whom it behoves them to put to death ? . . .

I admire Othello, but he does not appear to me to live the
august daily life of a Hamlet, who has the time to live, inasmuch
as he does not act. Othello is admirably jealous. But is it not
perhaps an ancient error to imagine that it is at the moments
when this passion, or others of equal violence, possesses us, that
we live our truest lives ? I have grown to believe that an old
man, seated in his arm-chair, waiting patiently, with his lamp
beside him; giving unconscious ear to all the eternal laws that
reign about his house ;* interpreting, without comprehending, the
silence of doors and windows and the quivering voice of the
light; submitting with bent head to the presence of his soul and
his destiny, — an old man, who conceives not that all the powers
of this world, like so many heedful servants, are mingling and
keeping vigil in his room, who suspects not that the very sun
itself is supporting in space the little table against which he
leans, or that every star in heaven and every fibre of the soul
are directly concerned in the movement of an eyelid that closes,
or a thought that springs to birth, — I have grown to believe that
he, motionless as he is, does yet live in reality a deeper, more
human, and more universal life than the lover who strangles his
mistress, the captain who conquers in battle, or <(the husband
who avenges his honor. }>

9564

DR. WILLIAM MAGINN

(1793-1842)

JLACKWOOD was astonished one day by the intrusion of a wild
Irishman from Cork into the publishing house of the staid
Scotch magazine. With much warmth and an exaggerated
brogue the stranger demanded to know the identity of one Ralph
Tuckett Scott, who had been printing things in the periodical. Of
course he was not told, and was very coldly treated; but Mr. Black-
wood was much delighted at last to find in the person of his guest
the original of his valued and popular Irish contributor, who taking

this odd method disclosed the personality
and name of William Maginn, a young
schoolmaster who had begun to write over
the name of Grossman, and afterwards as-
sumed several other pseudonyms before he
settled upon the famous <(Sir Morgan O'Do-
herty.»

Born in the city of Cork, July loth, 1793,
William Maginn may be said to have taken
in learning with his mother's milk. His
father conducted an academy for boys in
the Irish Athens, as Cork was then called;
and the future editor of Eraser's Magazine
was prepared for *and entered Trinity Col-
lege, Dublin, at the age of ten. He was

graduated at fourteen; and so extraordinary was his mind that he
was master not only of the classics but of most of the languages of
modern Europe, including of course his own ancestral Gaelic. When
his father died, William, then twenty years of age, took charge of
the academy in Marlborough Street, and in 1817 took his degree of
LL. D. at Trinity College. In the following year he made his way
into the field of letters. When he went to London in 1824, his repu-
tation as a brilliant writer was well established and enduring. He
had married in 1817 the daughter of the Rev. Mr. Bullen, rector of
Kanturk.

Immediately upon his removal to London, he was engaged by
Theodore Hook as editor of John Bull. In 1827 he boldly published
a broad and witty satire on Scott's historical novels. He was assist-
ant editor of the Evening Standard upon its institution, a position

DR. WILLIAM MAGINN

DR. WILLIAM MAGINN 9565

which he held for years at a salary of ^400. These years he said
afterwards were the happiest of his life. He was a sturdy Irishman,
and proud of his country; and he had what is often an Irishman's
Strongest weakness, — he was a spendthrift. His appreciation of his
relations toward creditors was embodied in the phrase (< They put
something in a book.* Little wonder then that his last years were
wretched and bailiff-haunted. The sketch of Captain Brandon in the
debtors' prison, in 'Pendennis,' is said to have been taken from this
period of Maginn's life.

Before this sad time, though, came a long era of prosperity, and
the days of the uncrowned sovereignty of letters as editor of Eraser's
Magazine. This periodical was started as a rival to Blackwood's
because Maginn had fallen out with the publishers of that magazine.
The first number appeared February ist, 1830; and before the year
was out it was not only a great financial success, but had upon its
staff the best of all the English writers. The attachment between
Dr. Maginn and Letitia E. Landon began in this time; and was,
though innocent enough, a sad experience for them both, — torturing
Maginn through the jealousy of his wife, and sending (< L. E. L.w to an
uncongenial marriage, and death by prussic acid in the exile of the
West Coast of Africa. Released from the Fleet by the Insolvency
Act in 1842, broken in health and spirit, Maginn went to the vil-
lage of Walton-on-Thames, where he died from consumption, penniless
and almost starving, on the 2ist of August of that year. Sir Robert
Peel had procured for him from the Crown a gift of ^100; but he
died without knowledge of the scanty gratuity.

SAINT PATRICK

A FIG for St. Denis of France,
He's a trumpery fellow to brag on;
A fig for St. George and his lance,

Which spitted a heathenish dragon ;
And the saints of the Welshman or Scot

Are a couple of pitiful pipers,
Both of whom may just travel to pot,
Compared with the patron of swipers,
St. Patrick of Ireland, my dear!

He came to the Emerald Isle

On a lump of a paving-stone mounted;
The steamboat he beat to a mile,

Which mighty good sailing was counted:

9566 DR. WILLIAM MAGINN

Says he, «The salt water, I think,

Has made me most bloodily thirsty;

So bring me a flagon of drink,

To keep down the mulligrubs, burst ye, —
Of drink that is fit for a saint. »

He preached then with wonderful force,

The ignorant natives a-teaching;
With a pint he washed down his discourse,

"For," says he, «I detest your dry preaching.15
The people, with wonderment struck

At a pastor so pious and civil,
Exclaimed, (< We're for you, my old buck,

And we pitch our blind gods to the Devil,
Who dwells in hot water below. w

This ended, our worshipful spoon

Went to visit an elegant fellow,
Whose practice each cool afternoon

Was to get most delightfully mellow.
That day, with a black-jack of beer,

It chanced he was treating a party:. .
Says the saint, <(This good day, do you hear,

I drank nothing to speak of, my hearty,
So give me a pull at the pot."

The pewter he lifted in sport

(Believe me, I tell you no fable);
A gallon he drank from the quart,

And then planted it full on the table.
<(A miracle ! w every one said,

And they all took a haul at the stingo:
They were capital hands at the trade,

And drank till they fell; yet, by jingo!
The pot still frothed over the brim.

Next day quoth his host, <( 'Tis a fast,

But I've naught in my larder but mutton;
And on Fridays who'd make such repast,

Except an unchristian-like glutton ? w
Says Pat, <( Cease your nonsense, I beg;

What you tell me is nothing but gammon:
Take my compliments down to the leg,

And bid it come hither a salmon ! w
And the leg most politely complied.

DR. WILLIAM MAGINN 9567

You've heard, I suppose, long ago,

How the snakes in a manner most antic
He marched to the County Mayo,

And trundled them into th' Atlantic.
Hence not to use water for drink

The people of Ireland determine;
With mighty good reason, I think,

Since St. Patrick had filled it with vermin,
And vipers, and other such stuff.

Oh, he was an elegant blade

As you'd meet from Fair Head to Kilcrumper;
And though under the sod he is laid,

Yet here goes his health in a bumper!
I wish he was here, that my glass

He might by art magic replenish;
But as he is not, why, alas!

My ditty must come to a finish —
Because all the liquor is out!

SONG OF THE SEA
«Woe to us when we lose the watery wall!)) — TIMOTHY TICKLER.

IF E'ER that dreadful hour should come — but God avert the day! —
When England's glorious flag must bend, and yield old Ocean's

sway ;

When foreign ships shall o'er that deep, where she is empress, lord;
When the cross of red from boltsprit-head is hewn by foreign sword;
When foreign foot her quarter-deck with proud stride treads along;
When her peaceful ships meet haughty check from hail of foreign

tongue :

One prayer, one only prayer is mine, — that ere is seen that sight,
Ere there be warning of that woe, I may be whelmed in night !

If ever other prince than ours wield sceptre o'er that main,
Where Howard, Blake, and Frobisher the Armada smote of Spain;
Where Blake, in Cromwell's iron sway, swept tempest-like the seas, -
From North to South, from East to West, resistless as the breeze;
Where Russell bent great Louis's power, which bent before to none,
And crushed his arm of naval strength, and dimmed his Rising Sun:
One prayer, one only prayer is mine, — that ere is seen that sight,
Ere there be warning of that woe, I may be whelmed in night!

9568

DR. WILLIAM MAGINN

If ever other keel than ours triumphant plow that brine, [line;

Where Rodney met the Count de Grasse, and broke the Frenchman's
Where Howe upon the first of June met the Jacobins in fight,
And with old England's loud huzzas broke down their godless might;
Where Jervis at St. Vincent's felled the Spaniards' lofty tiers,
Where Duncan won at Camperdown, and Exmouth at Algiers:
One prayer, one only prayer is mine, — that ere is seen that sight,
Ere there be warning of that woe, I may be whelmed in night!

But oh! what agony it were, when we should think on thee,

The flower of all the Admirals that ever trod the sea!

I shall not name thy honored name; but if the white-cliffed Isle

Which reared the Lion of the deep, the Hero of the Nile, —

Him who 'neath Copenhagen's self o'erthrew the faithless Dane,

Who died at glorious Trafalgar, o'ervanquished France and Spain, —

Should yield her power, one prayer is mine, — that ere is seen that

sight,
Ere there be warning of that woe, I may be whelmed in night!

9569

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

(1839-)

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY is conspicuous among contemporary
Greek scholars and historians for devoting himself less to
the study of the golden age of the Greek intellect than to
the post-Alexandrian period, when the union of Greece with the
Orient produced the Hellenistic world. It is in this highly colored,
essentially modern world of decadent Greek energy that Professor
Mahaffy is most at home, and in which he finds the greatest number
of parallels to the civilization of his own day. He is disposed indeed
to link England and Ireland, through their
political life, to the Athens and Sparta of
the third century before Christ, and to find
precedents in the Grecian republics for
democratic conditions in the United States.
In the opening chapter of his ( Greek Life
and Thought,* after dwelling upon the hos-
tile attitude of Sparta and Athens towards
the Macedonian government, he adds, <( But
we are quite accustomed in our own day to
this Home-Rule and Separatist spirit. }>

It is this intimate manner of approach-
ing a far-off theme that gives to Professor
Mahaffy's work much of its interest. He is
continually translating ancient history into
the terms of modern life. <( Let us save ancient history, » he writes,
<(from its dreary fate in the hands of the dry antiquarian, the nar-
row scholar; and while we utilize all his research and all his learn-
ing, let us make the acts and lives of older men speak across the
chasm of centuries and claim kindred with the men and motives of
to-day. For this and this only is to write history in the full and real
sense. »

Whatever the merits of his scholarship, Professor Mahaffy has
adhered closely to his ideal of a historian. He has a thorough grasp
upon the spirit of that period for which he has the keenest appre-
ciation, and which he is able to present to his readers with the great-
est clearness and vividness of color and outline. It is true, doubtless,
as he says, that the exclusive attention paid by modern scholars to the

J. P. MAHAFFY

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

age of spotless Atticism has overshadowed that Oriental-Hellenistic
world which rose after Alexander sank. The majority of persons
know little of that rich life of decaying arts and flourishing philoso-
phies, and strangely modern political and social conditions, which had
its centres in Alexandria and Antioch. It is of this that Professor
Mahaffy writes familiarly in his < Greek Life and Thought,' and in
his ( Greek World under Roman Sway.* He succeeds in throwing a
great deal of light upon this period of history; less perhaps through
sheer force of scholarship than through his happy faculty of finding
a family relationship in the poets, philosophers, statesmen, and kings
of a long-dead world. What he may lose as a <(pure scholar w he
thus gains as a historian.

In his classical researches, he has profited greatly by his acquaint-
ance with German investigations in this field. Although of Irish
parentage, he was born in Switzerland in 1839, and the roots of his
education were fixed in the soil of German scholarship. His subse-
quent residence at Trinity College, Dublin, as professor of ancient
history, has by no means weaned him from his earlier educational
influences. He attaches the utmost importance to the thorough-going
spirit of the German Grecians. He makes constant use of their discov-
eries. Nevertheless Professor Mahaffy is more of a sympathetic Irish
historian or historical essayist than a strict Greek scholar after the
German pattern. He is at his best when he is writing of the social
side of Hellenistic life. His < Greek Life and Thought, > his < Greek
World under Roman Sway, * his < Survey of Greek Civilization, * his
< Social Life in Greece, y show keen insight into the conditions which
governed the surface appearances of a world whose colors have not
yet faded. This world of Oriental sensuousness wedded to Greek
intelligence, this world which began with Demosthenes and Alexan-
der and ended with Nero and St. John, seems to Professor Mahaffy
a more perfect prototype of the modern world than the purer Attic
civilization which preceded it, or the civilization of Imperial Rome
which followed it.

Like the majority of modern Greek scholars, Professor Mahaffy has
engaged in antiquarian research upon the soil of Greece itself. His
( Rambles and Studies in Greece, > a work of conversational charm,
shows not a little poetical feeling for the memories that haunt the
living sepulchre of a great dead race.

Other works of Professor Mahaffy include < Problems in Greek
History, > ( Prolegomena to Ancient History, > < Lectures on Primitive
Civilization, } <The Story of Alexander's Empire, > (Old Greek Life,'
and the < History of Classical Greek Literature. } His value as a
historian and student of Greek life lies mainly in his power of sug-
gestion, and in his original and fearless treatment of subjects usually

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

approached with the dreary deference of self-conscious scholarship.
His revelation of the same human nature linking the world of two
thousand years ago to the world of the present day, has earned for
his Greek studies deserved popularity.

CHILDHOOD IN ANCIENT LIFE

From <Old Greek Education >

WE FIND in Homer, especially in the Iliad, indications of the
plainest kind that Greek babies were like the babies of
modern Europe: equally troublesome, equally delightful to
their parents, equally uninteresting to the rest of society. The
famous scene in the sixth book of the Iliad, when Hector's infant,
Astyanax, screams at the sight of his father's waving crest, and
the hero lays his helmet on the ground that he may laugh and
weep over the child; the love and tenderness of Andromache,
and her pathetic laments in the twenty-second book, — are famil-
iar to all. She foresees the hardships and unkindnesses to her
orphan boy, <( who was wont upon his father's knees to eat the
purest marrow and the rich fat of sheep, and when sleep came
upon him, and he ceased his childish play, he would lie in the
arms of his nurse, on a soft cushion, satisfied with every comfort. J>
So again, a protecting goddess is compared to a mother keeping
the flies from her sleeping infant; and a pertinacious friend, to
a little girl who, running beside her mother, begs to be taken
up, holding her mother's dress and delaying her, and with tear-
ful eyes keeps looking up till the mother denies her no longer.
These are only stray references, and yet they speak no less clearly
than if we had asked for an express answer to a direct inquiry.
So we have the hesitation of the murderers sent to make away
with the infant Cypselus, who had been foretold to portend dan-
ger to the Corinthian Herods of that day. The smile of the
baby unmans — or should we rather say unbrutes ? — the first ruf-
fian, and so the task is passed on from man to man. This story
in Herodotus is a sort of natural Greek parallel to the great
Shakespearean scene, where another child sways his intended tor-
turer with an eloquence more conscious and explicit, but not per-
haps more powerful, than the radiant smile of the Greek baby.
Thus Euripides, the great master of pathos, represents Iphigenia
bringing her infant brother Orestes to plead for her. with that

9572 JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

unconsciousness of sorrow which pierces us to the heart more
than the most affecting rhetoric. In modern art a little child
playing about its dead mother, and waiting with contentment for
her awaking, is perhaps the most powerful appeal to human com-
passion which we are able to conceive.

On the other hand, the troubles of infancy were then as now
very great. We do not indeed hear of croup, or teething, or
measles, or whooping-cough. But these are occasional matters,
and count as nothing beside the inexorable tyranny of a sleepless
baby. For then as now, mothers and nurses had a strong preju-
dice in favor of carrying about restless children, and so soothing
them to sleep. The unpractical Plato requires that in his fabu-
lous Republic two or three stout nurses shall be in readiness to
carry about each child; because children, like gamecocks, gain
spirit and endurance by this treatment! What they really gain
is a gigantic power of torturing their mothers. Most children
can readily be taught to sleep in a bed, or even in an arm-chair,
but an infant once accustomed to being carried about will insist
upon it; and so it came that Greek husbands were obliged to
relegate their wives to another sleeping-room, where the nightly
squalling of the furious infant might not disturb the master as
well as the mistress of the house. But the Greek gentleman
was able to make good his damaged rest by a midday siesta, and
so required but little sleep at night. The modern father in
northern Europe, with his whole day's work and waking, is
therefore in a more disadvantageous position.

Of course very fashionable people kept nurses; and it was the
highest tone at Athens to have a Spartan nurse for the infant,
just as an English nurse is sought out among foreign noblesse.
We are told that these women made the child hardier, that they
used less swathing and bandaging, and allowed free play for the
limbs; and this, like all the Spartan physical training, was ap-
proved of and admired by the rest of the Greek public, though
its imitation was never suggested save in the unpractical specula-
tions of Plato.

Whether they also approved of a diet of marrow and mutton
suet, which Homer, in the passage just cited, considers the lux-
ury of princes, does not appear. As Homer was the Greek
Bible, — an inspired book containing perfect wisdom on all things,
human and divine, — there must have been many orthodox par-
ents who followed his prescription. But we hear no approval or

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

censure of such diet. Possibly marrow may have represented
our cod-liver oil in strengthening delicate infants. But as the
Homeric men fed far more exclusively on meat than their his-
torical successors, some vegetable substitute, such as olive oil,
inust have been in use later on. Even within our memory,
mutton suet boiled in milk was commonly recommended by phy-
sicians for the delicacy now treated by cod-liver oil. The sup-
posed strengthening of children by air and exposure, or by early
neglect of their comforts, was as fashionable at Sparta as it is
with many modern theorists; and it probably led in both cases
to the same result, — the extinction of the weak and delicate.
These theorists parade the cases of survival of stout children —
that is, their exceptional soundness — as the effect of this harsh
treatment, and so satisfy themselves that experience confirms
their views. Now with the Spartans this was logical enough;
for as they professed and desired nothing but physical results, as
they despised intellectual qualities and esteemed obedience to be
the highest of moral ones, they were perhaps justified in their
proceeding. So thoroughly did they advocate the production of
healthy citizens for military purposes, that they were quite con-
tent that the sickly should die. In fact, in the case of obviously
weak and deformed infants, they did not hesitate to expose them
in the most brutal sense, — not to cold and draughts, but to the
wild beasts in the mountains.

This brings us to the first shocking contrast between the
Greek treatment of children and ours. We cannot really doubt,
from the free use of the idea in Greek tragedies, in the comedies
of ordinary life, and in theories of political economy, that the
exposing of new-born children was not only sanctioned by public
feeling, but actually practiced throughout Greece. Various mo-
tives combined to justify or to extenuate this practice. In the
first place, the infant was regarded as the property of its parents,
indeed of its father, to an extent inconceivable to most modern
Europeans. The State only, whose claim overrode all other con-
siderations, had a right for public reasons to interfere with the
dispositions of a father. Individual human life had not attained
what may be called the exaggerated value derived from sundry
superstitions, which remains even after those superstitions have
decayed. And moreover, in many Greek States, the contempt
for commercial pursuits, and the want of outlet for practical en-
ergy, made the supporting of large families cumbersome, or the

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

subdivision of patrimonies excessive. Hence the prudence or the
selfishness of parents did not hesitate to use an escape which
modern civilization condemns as not only criminal but as horribly
cruel. How little even the noblest Greek theorists felt this ob-
jection appears from the fact that Plato, the Attic Moses, sanc-
tions infanticide under certain circumstances or in another form,
in his ideal State. In the genteel comedy it is often mentioned
as a somewhat painful necessity, but enjoined by prudence. No-
where does the agony of the mother's heart reach us through
their literature, save in one illustration used by the Platonic
Socrates, where he compares the anger of his pupils, when first
confuted out of their prejudices, to the fury of a young mother
deprived of her first infant. There is something horrible in the
very allusion, as if in after life Attic mothers became hardened
to this treatment. We must suppose the exposing of female
infants to have been not uncommon, until the just retribution
of barrenness fell upon the nation, and the population dwindled
away by a strange atrophy.

In the many family suits argued by the Attic orators, we do
not (I believe) find a case in wrhich a large family of children
is concerned. Four appears a larger number than the average.
Marriages between relations as close as uncle and niece, and even
half-brothers and sisters, were not uncommon; but the researches
of modern science have removed the grounds for believing that
this practice would tend to diminish the race. It would certainly
increase any pre-existing tendency to hereditary disease; yet we
do not hear of infantile diseases any more than we hear of deli-
cate infants. Plagues and epidemics were common enough; but
as already observed, we do not hear of measles, or whooping-
cough, or scarlatina, or any of the other constant persecutors of
our nurseries.

As the learning of foreign languages was quite beneath the
notions of the Greek gentleman, who rather expected all barba-
rians to learn his language, the habit of employing foreign nurses,
so useful and even necessary to good modern education, was well-
nigh unknown. It would have been thought a great misfortune
to any Hellenic child to be brought up speaking Thracian or
Egyptian. Accordingly foreign slave attendants, with their strange
accent and rude manners, were not allowed to take charge of
children till they were able to go to school and had learned their
m other tongue perfectly.

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

But the women's apartments, in which children were kept for
the first few years, are closed so completely to us that we can
but conjecture 'a few things about the life and care of Greek
babies. A few late epigrams tell the grief -of parents bereaved
of their infants. Beyond this, classical literature affords us no
light. The backwardness in culture of Greek women leads us to
suspect that then, as now, Greek babies were more often spoilt
than is the case among the serious northern nations. The term
<( Spartan mother }> is, however, still proverbial ; and no doubt in
that exceptional State, discipline was so universal and so highly
esteemed that it penetrated even to the nursery. But in the
rest of Greece, we may conceive the young child arriving at his
schoolboy age more willful and headstrong than most of our
more watched and worried infants. Archytas the philosopher
earned special credit for inventing the rattle, and saving much
damage to household furniture by occupying children with this
toy.

The .external circumstances determining a Greek boy's educa-
tion were somewhat different from ours. We must remember that
all old Greek life — except in rare cases, such as that of Elis, of
which we know nothing — was distinctly town life; and so, nat-
urally, Greek schooling was day-schooling, from which the child-
ren returned to the care of their parents. To hand over boys, far
less girls, to the charge of a boarding-school, was perfectly un-
known, and would no doubt have been gravely censured. Orphans
were placed under the care of their nearest male relative, even
when their education was provided (as it was in some cases) by
the State. Again, as regards the age of going to school, it would
naturally be early, seeing that the day-schools may well include
infants of tender age, and that in Greek households neither father
nor mother was often able or disposed to undertake the educa-
tion of the children. Indeed, we find it universal that even
the knowledge of the letters and reading were obtained from a
schoolmaster. All these circumstances would point to an early
beginning of Greek school life; whereas, on the other hand, the
small number of subjects required in those days, the absence from
the programme of various languages, of most exact sciences, and
of general history and geography, made it unnecessary to begin
so early, or work so hard, as our unfortunate children have to
do. Above all, there were no competitive examinations, except in
athletics and music. The Greeks never thought of promoting a

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

man for <(dead knowledge, J> but for his living grasp of science
or of life.

Owing to these causes, we find the theorists discussing, as they
now do, the expediency of waiting till the age of seven before
beginning serious education: some advising it, others recommend-
ing easy and half-playing lessons from an earlier period. And
then, as now, we find the same curious silence on the really
important fact that the exact number of years a child has lived
is nothing to the point in question; and that while one child
may be too young at seven to commence work, many more may
be distinctively too old.

At all events, we may assume in parents the same varieties
of over-anxiety, of over-indulgence, of nervousness, and of care-
lessness, about their children; and so it doubtless came to pass
that there was in many cases a gap between infancy and school
life which was spent in playing and doing mischief. This may
be fairly inferred, not only from such anecdotes as that of Alci-
biades playing with his fellows in the street, evidently without
the protection of any pedagogue, but also from the large nomen-
clature of boys' games preserved to us in the glossaries of later
grammarians.

These games are quite distinct from the regular exercises in
the palaestra. We have only general descriptions of them, and
these either by Greek scholiasts or by modern philologists. But
in spite of the sad want of practical knowledge of games shown
by both, the instincts of boyhood are so uniform that we can
often frame a very distinct idea of the sort of amusement popu-
lar among Greek children. For young boys, games can hardly
consist of anything else than either the practicing of some bodily
dexterity, such as hopping on one foot higher or longer than
is easy, or throwing further with a stone; or else some imitation
of war, such as snowballing, or pulling a rope across a line, or
pursuing under fixed conditions; or lastly, the practice of some
mechanical ingenuity, such as whipping a top or. shooting with
marbles. So far as climate or mechanical inventions have not
altered our little boys' games, we find all these principles rep-
resented in Greek games. There was the hobby or cock horse
(kdlamon, parab$nai); standing or hopping on one leg (askolidzeiri),
which, as the word askos implies, was attempted on a skin bottle
filled with liquid and greased; blindman's buff (chalke muia, lit-
erally <( brazen fly"), in which the boy cried, (< I am hunting a

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

brazen fly, )J and the rest answered, <( You will not catch it ; })
games of hide-and-seek, of taking- and releasing prisoners, of fool
in the middle, of playing at king: in fact, there is probably no
simple child's game now known which was not then in use.

A few more details may, however, be interesting. There was
a game called kyndalismos [Drive the peg], in which the kyndalon
was a peg of wood with a heavy end sharpened, which boys
sought to strike into a softened place in the earth so that it stood
upright and knocked out the peg of a rival. This reminds us of
the peg-top splitting which still goes on in our streets. Another,
called ostrakinda, consisted of tossing an oyster shell in the air,
of which one side was blackened or moistened and called night,
the other, day, — or sun and rain. The boys were divided into
two sides with these names; and according as their side of the
shell turned up, they pursued and took prisoners their adversaries.
On the other hand, epostrakismos was making a shell skip along
the surface of water by a horizontal throw, and winning by the
greatest number of skips. Eis omillan [At strife], though a gen-
eral expression for any contest, was specially applied to tossing
a knuckle-bone or smooth stone so as to lie in the centre of a
fixed circle, and to disturb those which were already in good
positions. This was also done into a small hole (tropd). They
seem to have shot dried beans from their fingers as we do mar-
bles. They spun coins on their edge (chalkismds) [game of cop-
pers].

Here are two games not perhaps so universal nowadays:
pentalithizein [Fives, Jackstones] was a technical word for toss-
ing up five pebbles or astragali, and receiving them so as to
make them lie on the back of the hand. Meloldnthe, or the
beetle game, consists in flying a beetle by a long thread, and
guiding him like a kite; but by way of improvement they at-
tached a waxed splinter, lighted, to his tail, — and this cruelty is
now practiced, according to a good authority (Papasliotis) , in
Greece, and has even been known to cause serious fires. Tops
were known under various names (bembix, strdmbos, strobilos),
one of them certainly a humming-top. So were hoops (trochoi).

Ball-playing was ancient and diffused, even among the Ho-
meric heroes. But as it was found very fashionable and care-
fully practiced by both Mexicans and Peruvians at the time of
the conquest, it is probably common to all civilized races. We
have no details left us of complicated games with balls; and the

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

mere throwing them up and catching them one from the other,
with some rhythmic motion, is hardly worth all the poetic fervor
shown about this game by the Greeks. But possibly the musical
and dancing accompaniments were very important, in the case of
grown people and in historical times. Pollux, however, — our
main authority for most of these games, — in one place distinctly
describes both football and hand-ball. <( The names, w he says, (< of
games with balls are — episkyros, phaininda, aporraxis, ourania.
The first is played by two even sides, who draw a line in the
centre which they call skyros, on which they place the ball.
They draw two other lines behind each side; and those who first
reach the ball throw it (rhiptousiri) over the opponents, whose
duty it is to catch it and return it, until one side drives the
other back over their goal line." Though Pollux makes no men-
tion of kicking, this game is evidently our football in substance.
He proceeds: * Phaininda was called either from Phainindes, the
first discoverer, or from pkenakizein [to play tricks], w etc., — we
need not follow his etymologies; (( and aporraxis consists of mak-
ing a ball bound off the ground, and sending it against a wall,
counting the number of hops according as it was returned. *' And
as if to make the anticipations of our games more curiously com-
plete, there is cited from the history of Manuel, by the Byzantine
Cinnamus (A. D. 1200), a clear description of the Canadian la-
crosse, a sort of hockey played with racquets: —

(C Certain youths, divided equally, leave in a level place, which
they have before prepared and measured, a ball made of leather,
about the size of an apple, and rush at it, as if it were a prize lying
in the middle, from their fixed starting-point [a goal]. Each of them
has in his right hand a racquet (rhdbdon) [wand, staff] of suitable
length, ending in a sort of flat bend, the middle of which is occupied
by gut strings dried by seasoning, and plaited together in net fash-
ion. Each side strives to be the first to bring it to ttie opposite end
of the ground from that allotted to them. Whenever the ball is
driven by the racquets (rhdbdoi} to the end of the ground, it counts
as a victory. >J

Two games which were not confined to children — and which
are not widely diffused, though they exist among us — are the use
of astragali, or knuckle-bones of animals, cut so nearly square as
to serve for dice; and with these children threw for luck, the
highest throw (sixes) being accounted the best. In later Greek
art, representations of Eros and other youthful figures engaged

JOHN PENTLAND MAHAFFY

with astragali are frequent. It is to be feared that this game
was an introduction to dice-playing, which was so common, and
so often abused that among the few specimens of ancient dice
remaining, there are some false and some which were evidently
loaded. The other game to which I allude is the Italian morra,
the guessing instantaneously how many fingers are thrown up by
the player and his adversary. It is surprising how fond southern
men and boys still are of this simple game, chiefly however for
gambling purposes.

There was tossing in a blanket, walking on stilts, swinging,
leap-frog, and many other similar plays, which are ill understood
and worse explained by the learned, and of no importance to
us, save as proving the general similarity of the life of little boys
then and now.

We know nothing about the condition of little girls of the
same age, except that they specially indulged in ball-playing.
Like our own children, the girls probably joined to a lesser
degree in the boys' games, and only so far as they could be
carried on within doors, in the court of the house. There are
graceful representations of their swinging and practicing our see-
saw. Dolls they had in plenty, and doll-making (of clay) was
quite a special trade at Athens. In more than one instance we
have found in children's graves their favorite dolls, which sorrow-
ing parents laid with them as a S':>rt of keepsake in the tomb.

Most unfortunately there is hardly a word left of the nursery
rhymes, and of the folk-lore, which are very much more inter-
esting than the physical amusements of children. Yet we know
that such popular songs existed in plenty; we know too, from
the early fame of ^Esop's fables, from the myths so readily
invented and exquisitely told by Plato, that here we have lost a
real fund of beautiful and stimulating children's stories. And of
course, here too the general character of such stories throughout
the human race was preserved.

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN

(1840-1914)

[HE power of genius to discover new relations between famil-
iar facts is strikingly exemplified in Admiral Alfred Thayer
Mahan's studies of the influence of sea power upon history.
The data cited in his works are common literary property; but the
conclusions drawn from them are a distinct contribution to historical
science. Admiral Mahan was the first writer to demonstrate the deter-
mining force which maritime strength has exercised upon the fortunes of
individual nations, and consequently upon the course of general history.

Technically, one of his representative works, the (Influence of Sea
Power upon History,) is but a naval history of Europe from the re-
storation of the Stuarts to the end of the American Revolution. But
the freedom with which it digresses on general questions of naval policy
and strategy, the attention which it pays to the relation of cause and
effect between maritime events and international politics, and the
author's literary method of treatment, place this work outside the class
of strictly professional writings, and entitle it already to be regarded
as an American classic. In Europe as well as in America, it has been
recognized as an epoch-making work in the field of naval history.

The contents of Admiral Mahan's great studies of naval history
were originally given forth in a course of lectures delivered before
the Naval War College at Newport, Rhode Island; and Admiral Ma-
han's prime object, in establishing the thesis that maritime strength
is a determining factor in the prosperity of nations, was to reinforce
his argument that the future interests of the United States require a
departure from the traditional American policy of neglect of naval-
military affairs. Admiral Mahan has maintained that, as openings to
immigration and enterprise in North America and Australia diminish,
a demand will arise for a more settled government in the disordered
semi-barbarous states of Central and South America. He lays down
the proposition that stability of institutions is necessary to commer-
cial intercourse; and that a demand for such stability can hardly
be met without the intervention of interested civilized nations. Thus
international complications may be fairly anticipated; and the date
of their advent will be precipitated by the completion of a canal
through the Central-American isthmus. The strategic conditions of
the Mediterranean will be reproduced in the Caribbean Sea, and in
the' international struggle for the control of the new highway of
commerce the United States will have the advantage of geographical

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN 9581

position. He points out that the carrying trade of the United States
is at present insignificant, only because the opening of the West
since the Civil War has made maritime undertakings less profitable
than the development of the internal resources of the country. It is
thus shown to be merely a question of time when American capital
will again seek the ocean; and Admiral Mahan urges that the United
States should seek to guard the interests of the future by building
up a strong military navy, and fortifying harbors commanding the
Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea.

Admiral Mahan's biography was simple and professional. He was
born September 27th, 1840. A graduate of the U. S. Naval Academy,
he served in the Union navy as a lieutenant throughout the Civil
War, and was president of the Naval War College from 1886 to 1889
and from 1890 to 1893. In 1896 he retired from active service but was
a member of the Naval Board of Strategy during the war between
Spain and the United States. He was made rear-admiral in 1906. He
became a voluminous writer on his peculiar subject or its closely kindred
topics. Besides the work already mentioned, his writings include
(The Gulf and Inland Waters) (1883); (Life of Admiral Farragut)
(1892); (Influence of Sea Power upon the French Revolution and
Empire) (1892), a continuation of the (Influence of Sea Power upon
History); (The Life of Nelson, the Embodiment of the Sea Power of
Great Britain) (1897); (Sea Power in its Relation to the War of 1812)
(1905); (From Sail to Steam) (1907); (The Interest of America in Inter-
national Conditions) (1910); (Naval Strategy) (1911); and (Arma-
ments and Arbitration) (1912). His other books may be regarded as
supplements and continuations of the new interpretation of history
set forth in his (Influence of Sea Power upon History.) He died in
1914 before he could witness for himself the supreme test to which the
Great War was to put his theories and prophecies.

THE IMPORTANCE OF CRUISERS AND OF STRONG FLEETS

IN WAR

From <The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783. > Copyright 1890,
by Captain A. T. Mahan. Reprinted by permission of the author, and
of Little, Brown & Co., publishers.

THE English, notwithstanding their heavy loss in the Four
Days' Battle, were at sea again within two months, much
to the surprise of the Dutch; and on the 4th of August
another severe fight was fought off the North Foreland, ending
in the complete defeat of the latter, who retired to their own
coasts. The English followed, and effected an entrance into

9582

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN

one of the Dutch harbors, where they destroyed a large fleet
of merchantmen as well as a town of some importance. Toward
the end of 1666 both sides [England and Holland] were tired
of the war, which was doing great harm to trade, and weaken-
ing both navies to the advantage of the growing sea power of
France. Negotiations looking toward peace were opened; but
Charles II., ill disposed to the United Provinces, confident that
the growing pretensions of Louis XIV. to the Spanish Nether-
lands would break up the existing alliance between Holland and
France, and relying also upon the severe reverses suffered at sea
by the Dutch, was exacting and haughty in his demands. To
justify and maintain this line of conduct he should have kept
up his fleet, the prestige of which had been so advanced by its
victories. Instead of that, poverty, the result of extravagance
and of his home policy, led him to permit it to decline ; ships in
large numbers were laid up; and he readily adopted an opinion
which chimed in with his penury, and which, as it has had advo-
cates at all periods of sea history, should be noted and con-
demned here. This opinion, warmly opposed by Monk, was: —

(<That as the Dutch were chiefly supported by trade, as the sup
ply of their navy depended upon trade, and as experience showed,
nothing provoked the people so much as injuring their trade, his
Majesty should therefore apply himself to this, which would effectu-
ally humble them, at the same time that it would less exhaust the
English than fitting out such mighty fleets as had hitherto kept the
sea every summer. . . . Upon these motives the King took a
fatal resolution of laying up his great ships, and keeping only a few
frigates on the cruise. »

In consequence of this economical theory of carrying on a
war, the Grand Pensionary of Holland, De Witt, who had the
year before caused soundings of the Thames to be made, sent
into the river, under De Ruyter, a force of sixty or seventy ships
of the line, which on the i4th of June, 1667, went up as high
as Gravesend, destroying ships at Chatham and in the Medway,
and taking possession of Sheerness. The light of the fires could
be seen from London; and the Dutch fleet remained in possession
of the mouth of the river until the end of the month. Under
this blow, following as it did upon the great plague and the
great fire of London, Charles consented to peace, which was
signed July 3ist, 1667, and is known as the Peace of Breda. The
most lasting result of the war was the transfer of New York and

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN 9583

New Jersey to England, thus joining her northern and southern
colonies in North America.

Before going on again with the general course of the history
of the times, it will be well to consider for a moment the theory
which worked so disastrously for England in 1667; that, namely,
of maintaining a sea war mainly by preying upon the enemy's
commerce. This plan, which involves only the maintenance of a
few swift cruisers and can be backed by the spirit of greed in a
nation, fitting out privateers without direct expense to the State,
possesses the specious attractions which economy always presents.
The great injury done to the wealth and prosperity of the enemy
is also undeniable ; and although ' to some extent his merchant
ships can shelter themselves ignobly under a foreign flag while
the war lasts, this guerre de course, as the French call it, — this
commerce-destroying, to use our own phrase, — must, if in itself
successful, greatly embarrass the foreign government and distress
its people. Such a war, however, cannot stand alone: it must be
supported, to use the military phrase; unsubstantial and evanes-
cent in itself, it cannot reach far from its base. That base must
be either home ports or else some solid outpost of the national
power on the shore or the sea; a distant dependency or a
powerful fleet. Failing such support, the cruiser can only dash
out hurriedly a short distance from home; and its blows, though
painful, cannot be fatal. It was not the policy of 1667, but
Cromwell's powerful fleets of ships of the line in 1652, that shut
the Dutch merchantmen in their ports and caused the grass to
grow in the streets of Amsterdam. When, instructed by the suffer-
ing of that time, the Dutch kept large fleets afloat through two
exhausting wars, though their commerce suffered greatly, they
bore up the burden of the strife against England and France
united. Forty years later, Louis XIV. was driven by exhaustion
to the policy adopted by Charles II. through parsimony. Then
were the days of the great French privateers, — Jean Bart, For-
bin, Duguay-Trouin, Du Casse, and others. The regular fleets of
the French navy were practically withdrawn from the ocean dur-
ing the great War of the Spanish Succession (1702-1712). The
French naval historian says: —

(< Unable to renew the naval armaments, Louis XIV. increased the
number of cruisers lipon the more frequented seas, especially the
Channel and the German Ocean [not far from home, it will be noticed].

95^4

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN

In these different spots the cruisers were always in a position to inter-
cept or hinder the movements of transports laden with troops, and of
the numerous convoys carrying supplies of all kinds. In these seas,
in the centre of the commercial and political world, there is always
work for cruisers. Notwithstanding the difficulties they met, owing
to the absence of large friendly fleets, they served advantageously the
cause of the two peoples [French and Spanish]. These cruisers, in
the face of the Anglo-Dutch power, needed good luck, boldness, and
skill. These three conditions were not lacking to our seamen; but
then, what chiefs and what captains they had ! }>

The English historian, on the other hand, while admitting
how severely the people and commerce of England suffered from
the cruisers, bitterly reflecting at times upon the administration,
yet refers over and over again to the increasing prosperity of
the whole country, and especially of its commercial part. In the
preceding war, on the contrary, from 1689 to 1697, when France
sent great fleets to sea and disputed the supremacy of the ocean,
how different the result! The same English writer says of that
time : —

(<With respect to our trade, it is certain that we suffered infinitely
more, not merely than the French, for that was to be expected from
the greater number of our merchant ships, but than we ever did in
any former war. . . . This proceeded in great measure from the
vigilance of the French, who carried on the war in a piratical way.
It is out of all doubt that, taking all together, our traffic suffered
excessively; our merchants were many of them ruined. »

Macaulay says of this period: (< During many months of 1693
the English trade with the Mediterranean had been interrupted
almost entirely. There was no chance that a merchantman
from London or Amsterdam would, if unprotected, reach the Pil-
lars of Hercules without being boarded by a French privateer;
and the protection of armed vessels was not easily obtained. })
Why? Because the vessels of England's navy were occupied
watching the French navy, and this diversion of them from the
cruisers and privateers constituted the support which a commerce-
destroying war must have. A French historian, speaking of the
same period in England (1696), says: <( The state of the finances
was deplorable: money was scarce, maritime insurance thirty
per cent., the Navigation Act was virtually suspended, and the
English shipping reduced to the necessity of sailing under the
Swedish and Danish flags. w Half a century later the French

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN

9585

government was again reduced, by long neglect of the navy, to
a cruising warfare. With what results? First, the French his-
torian says: <( From June 1756 to June 1760, French privateers
captured from the English more than twenty-five hundred mer-
chantmen. In 1761, though France had not, so to speak, a single
ship of the line at sea, and though the English had taken two
hundred and forty of our privateers, their comrades still took
eight hundred and twelve vessels. But," he goes on to say,
(<the prodigious growth of the English shipping explains the
number of these prizes. }) In other words, the suffering involved
to England in such numerous captures, which must have caused
great individual injury and discontent, did not really prevent the
growing prosperity of the State and of the community at large.
The English naval historian, speaking of the same period, says:
<( While the commerce of France was nearly destroyed, the trad-
ing fleet of England covered the seas. Every year her com-
merce was increasing; the money which the war carried out was
returned by the produce of her industry. Eight thousand mer-
chant vessels were employed by the English merchants. }> And
again, summing up the results of the war, after stating the
immense amount of specie brought into the kingdom by foreign
conquests, he says: <(The trade of England increased gradually
every year; and such a scene of national prosperity, while waging
a long, bloody, and costly war, was never before shown by any
people in the world. w

On the other hand, the historian of the French navy, speaking
of an earlier phase of the same wars, says: (<The English fleets,
having nothing to resist them, swept the seas. Our privateers
and single cruisers, having no fleet to keep down the abundance
of their enemies, ran short careers. Twenty thousand French
seamen lay in English prisons. When, on the other hand, in
the War of the American Revolution, France resumed the policy
of Colbert and of the early reign of Louis XIV., and kept large
battle fleets afloat, the same result again followed as in the days
of Tourville." (< For the first time," says the Annual Register, for-
getting or ignorant of the experience of 1693, and remembering
only the glories of the later wars, <( English merchant ships were
driven to take refuge under foreign flags. }) Finally, in quitting
this part of the subject, it may be remarked that in the Island of
Martinique the French had a powerful distant dependency upon
which to base a cruising warfare; and during the Seven Years'

95 86 ALFRED THAYER MAHAN

War, as afterward during the First Empire, it, with Guadaloupe,
was the refuge of numerous privateers. <(The records of the
English admiralty raise the losses of the English in the West
Indies during the first years of the Seven Years' War to four-
teen hundred merchantmen taken or destroyed. }) The English
fleet was therefore directed against the islands, both of which
fell, involving a loss to the trade of France greater than all the
depredations of her cruisers on the English commerce, besides
breaking up the system; but in the war of 1778 the great fleets
protected the islands, which were not even threatened at any
time.

So far we have been viewing the effect of a purely cruis-
ing warfare, not based upon powerful squadrons, only upon that
particular part of the enemy's strength against which it is theo-
retically directed, — upon his commerce and general wealth, upon
the sinews of war. The evidence seems to show that even for its
own special ends such a mode of war is inconclusive, — worrying
but not deadly; it might almost be said that it causes needless
suffering. What, however, is the effect of this policy upon the
general ends of the war, to which it is one of the means and to
which it is subsidiary ? How, again, does it react upon the people
that practice it ? As the historical evidences will come up in
detail from time to time, it need here only be summarized.

The result to England in the days of Charles II. has been
seen, — her coast insulted, her shipping burned almost within
sight of her capital. In the War of the Spanish Succession,
when the control of Spain was the military object, while the
French depended upon a cruising war against commerce, the
navies of England and Holland, unopposed, guarded the coasts
of the peninsula, blocked the port of Toulon, forced the French
succors to cross the Pyrenees, and by keeping open the sea high-
way, neutralized the geographical nearness of France to the seat
of war. Their fleets seized Gibraltar, Barcelona, and Minorca;
and co-operating with the Austrian army, failed by little of .redu-
cing Toulon. In the Seven Years' War the English fleets seized,
or aided in seizing, all the most valuable colonies of France and
Spain, and made frequent descents on the French coast.

The War of the American Revolution affords no lesson, the
fleets being nearly equal. The next most striking instance to
Americans is the War of 1812. Everybody knows how our pri-
vateers swarmed over the seas; and that from the smallness of

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN 9587

our navy the war was essentially, indeed solely, a cruising- war.
Except upon the lakes, it is doubtful if more than two of our
ships at any time acted together. The injury done to English
commerce, thus unexpectedly attacked by a distant foe which had
been undervalued, may be fully conceded; but on the one hand,
the American cruisers were powerfully supported by the French
fleet, which, being assembled in larger or smaller bodies in the
many ports under the Emperor's control from Antwerp to Venice,
tied the fleets of England to blockade duty; and on the other
hand, when- the fall of the Emperor released them, our coasts
were insulted in every direction, the Chesapeake entered and con-
trolled, its shores wasted, the Potomac ascended, and Washington
burned. The Northern frontier was kept in a state of alarm,
though there, squadrons absolutely weak but relatively strong
sustained the general defense; while in the South the Mississippi
was entered unopposed, and New Orleans barely saved. When
negotiations for peace were opened, the bearing of the English
toward the American envoys was not that of men who felt their
country to be threatened with an unbearable evil.

The late Civil War, with the cruises of the Alabama and
Sumter and their consorts, revived the tradition of commerce-
destroying. In so far as this is one means to a general end, and
is based upon a navy otherwise powerful, it is well; but we need
not expect to see the feats of those ships repeated in the face of
a great sea power. In the first place, those cruises were power-
fully supported by the determination of the United States to
blockade, not only the chief centres of Southern trade, but every
inlet of the coast, thus leaving few ships available for pursuit;
in the second place, had there been ten of those cruisers where
there was one, they would not have stopped the incursion in
Southern waters of the Union fleet, which penetrated to every
point accessible from the sea; and in the third place, the un-
deniable injury, direct and indirect, inflicted upon individuals
and upon one branch of the nation's industry (and how high that
shipping industry stands in the writer's estimation need not be
repeated), did not in the least influence or retard the event of
the war. Such injuries, unaccompanied by others, are more irri-
tating than weakening. On the other hand, will any refuse to
admit that the work of the great Union fleets powerfully modified
and hastened an end which was probably inevitable in any case ?
As a sea power the South then occupied the place of France in

9588

ALFRED THAYER MAHAN

the wars we have been considering1, while the situation of the
North resembled that of England; and as in France, the suffer-
ers in the Confederacy were not a class, but the government and
the nation at large.

It is not the taking of individual ships or convoys, be they
few or many, that strikes down the money power of a nation: it
is the possession of that overbearing power on the sea which
drives the enemy's flag from it, or allows it to appear only as a
fugitive; and which, by controlling the great common, closes the
highways by which commerce moves to and from the enemy's
shores. This overbearing power can only be exercised by great
navies; and by them (on the broad sea) less efficiently now than
in the days when the neutral flag had not its present immunity.
It is not unlikely that in the event of a war between maritime
nations, an attempt may be made by the one having a great
sea power, and wishing to break down its enemy's commerce, to
interpret the phrase <( effective blockade w in the manner that
best suits its interests at the time; to assert that the speed and
disposal of its ships make the blockade .effective at much greater
distances and with fewer ships than formerly. The determination
of such a question will depend, not upon the weaker belligerent,
but upon neutral powers: it will raise the issue between bel-
ligerent and neutral rights; and if the belligerent have a vastly
overpowering navy he may carry his point, — just as England,
when possessing the mastery of the seas, long refused to admit
the doctrine of the neutral flag covering the goods.

95^9

MOSES MAIMONIDES

(1135-1204)

BY. RABBI GOTTHEIL

IHE conclusion of the whole matter is, Go either to the right,
my heart, or go to the left; but believe all that Rabbi Moses
ben Maimon has believed, — the last of the Gaonim [religious
teachers] in time, but the first in rank.*' In such manner did the
most celebrated Jewish poet in Provence voice in his quaint way the
veneration with which the Jewish Aristotle of Cordova was regarded.
For well-nigh four hundred years, the descendants of Isaac had lived
in the Spanish Peninsula the larger life opened up to them by the
sons of Ishmael. They had with ardor cultivated their spiritual pos-
sessions— the only ones they had been able to save — as they passed
through shipwreck and all manner of ill fortune from the fair lands
of the East. The height of their spiritual fortune was manifested in
this second Moses, whom they did not scruple to compare with the
first bearer of that name.

Abu Amram Musa ibn Ibrahim Ubeid Allah, as his full Arabic
name ran, was born in the city of Cordova, <(the Mecca of the West,*
on March 3oth, 1135. His father was learned in Talmudic lore; and
from him the young student must have gotten his strong love of
knowledge. At an early period he developed a taste for the exact
sciences and for philosophy. He read with zeal not only the works
of the Mohammedan scholastics, but also those of the Greek philoso-
phers in such dress as they had been made accessible by their
Arabian translators. In this way his mind, which by nature ran in
logical and systematic grooves, was strengthened in its bent; and he
acquired that distaste for mysticism and vagueness which is so char-
acteristic of his literary labors. He went so far as to abhor poetry,
the best of which he declared to be false, since it was founded upon
pure invention — and this too in a land which had produced such
noble expressions of the Hebrew and Arab Muse.

It is strange that this man, whose character was that of a sage,
and who was revered for his person as well as for his books, should
have led such an unquiet life, and have written his works so full
of erudition with the staff of the wanderer in his hand. For his
peaceful studies were rudely disturbed in his thirteenth year by the

MOSES MAIMONIDES

invasion of the Almohades, or Mohammedan Unitarians, from Africa.
They not only captured Cordova, but set up a form of religious per-
secution which happily is not always characteristic of Islamic piety.
Maimonides's father wandered to Almeria on the coast; and then
(1159) straight into the lion's jaws at Fez in Africa, — a line of conduct
hardly intelligible in one who had fled for the better exercise of the
dictates of conscience. So pressing did the importunities of the Almo-
had fanatics become, that together with his family Maimonides was
compelled to don the turban, and to live for several years the life of
an Arabic Marrano. This blot upon his fair fame — if blot it be — he
tried to excuse in two treatises, which may be looked upon as his
<( apologia pro vita sua": one on the subject of conversion in general
(1160), and another addressed to his co-religionists in Southern Arabia
on the coming of the Messiah. But the position was an- untenable
one; and in 1165 we find Maimonides again on the road, reaching
Accho, Jerusalem, Hebron, and finally Egypt. Under the milder rule
of the Ayyubite Caliphs, no suppression of his belief was necessary.
Maimonides settled with his brother in old Cairo or Fostat; gaining
his daily pittance, first as a jeweler, and then in the practice of medi-
cine ; the while he continued in the study of philosophy and the elab-
oration of the great works upon which his fame reposes. In 1177 he
was recognized as the head of the Jewish community of Egypt, and
soon afterwards was placed upon the list of court physicians to Sala-
din. He breathed his last on December 13th, 1204, and his body was
taken to Tiberias for burial.

Perhaps no fairer presentation of the principles and practices of
Rabbinical Judaism can be cited than that contained in the three
chief works of Maimonides. His clear-cut mind gathered the various
threads which Jewish theology and life had spun since the closing of
the Biblical canon, and wove them into such a fabric that a new
period may fitly be said to have been ushered in. The Mishnah had
become the law-book of the Diaspora: in it was to be found the sys-
tem of ordinances and practices which had been developed up to the
second century A. D. In the scholastic discussions in which the Jew-
ish schoolmen had indulged their wit and their ingenuity, much of
its plain meaning had become obscured. At the age of twenty-three
Maimonides commenced to work upon a commentary to this Mishnah,
which took him seven years to complete. It was written in Arabic,
and very fitly called ( The Illumination > ; for here the philosophic
training of its author was brought to bear upon the dry legal mass,
and to give it life as well as light. The induction of philosophy into
law is seen to even more peculiar advantage in his Mishnah Torah
(Repeated Law). The scholastic discussions upon the Mishnah had in
the sixth century been put into writing, and had become that vast

MOSES MAIMONIDES

9591

medley of thought, that kaleidoscope of schoolroom life, which is
known by the name of Talmud. Based upon the slender framework
of the Mishnah, the vast edifice had been built up with so little plan
and symmetry that its various ramifications could only be followed
with the greatest difficulty and with infinite exertion. In turn, the
Talmud had supplanted the Mishnah as the rule of life and the direct-
ive of religious observance. Even before the time of Maimonides-
scholars had tried their hand at putting order into this great chaos;
but none of their efforts had proved satisfactory. For ten years
Maimonides worked and produced this digest, in which he arranged
in scientific order all the material which a Jewish jurist and theo-
logian might be called upon to use. Though this digest was received
with delight by the Jews of Spain, many were found who looked upon
Maimonides's work as an attempt to crystallize into unchangeable law
the fluctuating streams of tradition. The same objection was made
to his attempt to formulate into a creed 'the purely theological ideas
of the Judaism of his day. His ( Thirteen Articles y brought on a war
of strong opposition; and though in the end, the fame of their author
conquered a place for them even in the Synagogue . Ritual, they were
never accepted by the entire Jewry. They remained the presentation
of an individual scholar.

But his chief philosophical work, his ( Guide of the Perplexed >
(Dalalat al Hai'rin), carried him still further; and for centuries fairly
divided the Jewish camp into two parties. The battle between the
Maimonists and anti-Maimonists waged fiercely in Spain and Provence.
The bitterness of the strife is represented in the two inscriptions
which were placed upon his tombstone. The first read: —

<(Here lies a man, and still a man;
If thou wert a man, angels of heaven
Must have overshadowed thy mother. w

This was effaced and a second one placed in its stead: —

<(Here lies Moses Maimuni, the excommunicated heretic. })

In the ( Guide of the Perplexed y Maimonides has also produced a
work which was (< epoch-making w in Jewish philosophy. It is the best
attempt ever made by a Jew to combine philosophy with theology.
Aristotle was known to Maimonides through Al-Farabi and Ibn Sina
(Avicenna); and he is convinced that the Stagyrite is to be followed
in certain things, as he is that the Bible must be followed in others.
In fact, there can be no divergence between the two; for both have
the same end in view, — to prove the existence of God. The aim of
metaphysics is to perfect man intellectually; the same aim is at the
core of Talmudic Judaism. Reason and revelation must speak th»

MOSES MAIMONIDES

same language ; and by a peculiar kind of subtle exegesis — which
provoked much opposition, as it seemed to do violence to the plain
wording — he is able to find his philosophical ideas in the text oi
the Bible. But he is careful to limit his acquiescence in Aristotle's
teaching to things which occur below the sphere of the moon. He
was afraid of coming into contact with the foundations of religious
belief, and of having to deny the existence of wonders. The Bible
teaches that matter was created, and the arguments advanced in favoi
of both the Platonic and Aristotelian views he looks upon as insuffi-
cient. The Jewish belief that God brought into existence not only the
form but also the matter of the world, Maimonides looks upon much
as an article of faith. The same is true of the belief in a resurrec-
tion. He adduces so little proof for this dogma that the people of
his day were ready to charge him with heresy.

Maimonides is able to present twenty-five ontological arguments
for his belief in the existence, unity, and incorporeality of God. What
strikes one most is the almost colorless conception of the Deity at
which he arrives. In his endeavor to remove the slightest shadow of
corporeality in this conception, he is finally led to deny that any
positive attributes can be posited of God. Such attributes would only
be "accidentia"; and any such <( acciden'tia >} would limit the idea
of oneness. Even attributes which would merely show the relation of
the Divine Being to other beings are excluded; because he is so far
removed from things non-Divine, as to make all comparison impossi-
ble. Even existence, when spoken of in regard to him, is not an
attribute. In his school language, the "essentia" of God involves
his <( existentia. » We have therefore to rely entirely upon negative
attributes in trying to get a clear concept of the Deity.

If the Deity is so far removed, how then is he to act upon the
world ? Maimonides supposes that this medium is to be found in the
world of the spheres. Of these spheres there are nine: "the all-
encompassing sphere, that of the fixed stars, and those of the seven
planets. >J Each sphere is presided over by an intelligence which is
its motive power. These intelligences are called angels, in the Bible.
The highest intelligence is immaterial. It is the nods poietikos, the
ever-active intellect. It is the power which gives form to all things,
and makes that which was potential really existent. (< Prophecy is
an emanation sent forth by the Divine Being through the medium of
the active intellect, in the first instance to man's rational faculty and
then to his imaginative faculty. The lower grade of prophecy comes
by means of dreams, the higher through visions accorded the prophet
in a waking condition. The symbolical actions of the prophets are
nothing more than states of the soul.® High above all the prophets
Maimonides places Moses, to whom he attributes a special power, by

MOSES MAIMONIDES

means of which the active intellect worked upon him without the
mediation of the imagination.

The psychological parts of the c Guide * present in a Jewish garb
the Peripatetic philosophy as expounded by Alexander of Aphrodisia.
Reason exists in the powers of the soul, but only potentially as latent
reason (notis htilikos). It has the power to assimilate immaterial forms
which come from the active reason. It thus becomes acquired or
developed reason (nods epiktetos)\ and by still further assimilation it
becomes gradually an entity separable from the body, so that at
death it can live on unattached to the body.

In ethics Maimonides is a strong partisan of the doctrine of the
freedom of the will. No one moves him, no one drives him to cer-
tain actions. He can choose, according to his own inner vision, the
way on which he wishes to walk. Nor does this doctrine involve any
limitation of the Divine power, as this freedom is fully predetermined
by the Deity. But Maimonides must have felt the difficulty of squar-
ing the doctrine of the freedom of the will with that of the omnis-
cience of God; for he intrenches himself behind the statement that
the knowledge. of God is so far removed from human knowledge as
to make all comparison impossible. Again, in true Aristotelian style,
Maimonides holds that those actions are to be considered virtuous
which follow the golden mean between the extremes of too much
and too little. The really wise man will always choose this road;
and such wisdom can be learned; by continued practice it can become
part of man's nature. He is most truly virtuous who has reached
this eminence, and who has eliminated from his own being even the
desire to do wrong.

The daring with which Maimonides treated many portions of
Jewish theology did not fail to show its effect immediately after the
publication of the c Guided His rationalistic notions about revela-
tion, his allegorizing interpretation of Scripture, his apparent want of
complete faith in the doctrine of resurrection, produced among the
Jews a .violent reaction against all philosophical inquiry, which lasted
down to the times of the French Revolution. Even non-Jews looked
askance at his system. Abd al-Latif, an orthodox Mohammedan, con-
sidered the ( Guide > « a bad book, which is calculated to undermine the
principles of religion through the very means which are apparently
designed to strengthen them"; and in Catholic Spain the writings of
(<Moyses hijo de Maymon Egipnachus" were ordered to be burned.
In Montpellier and in Paris, his own Jewish opponents, not content
with having gotten an edict against the use of the master's writings,
obtained the aid of the Church (for the < Guide > had been translated
into Latin in the thirteenth century), and had it publicly consigned
to the flames. But all this was only further evidence of the power

0594 MOSES MAIMONIDES

which Maimonides wielded. The Karaites copied it; the Kabbalah
even tried to claim it as its own. Many who were not of the House
of Israel, as Thomas Aquinas and Albertus Magnus, acknowledged the
debt they owed the Spanish Rabbi; and Spinoza, though in many
places an opponent, shows clearly how carefully he had studied the
< Guide of the Perplexed.*

EXTRACT FROM MAIMONIDES'S WILL

FEAR the Lord, but love him also; for fear only restrains a
man from sin, while love stimulates him to good.
Accustom yourselves to habitual goodness ;. for a man's
character is what habit makes it. ... The perfection of the
body is a necessary antecedent to the perfection of the soul; for
health is the key that unlocks the inner chamber. When I bid
you attend to your bodily and moral welfare, my object is to
open for you the gates of heaven. . . . Measure your words;
for the more your words, the more your errors. Ask for expla-
nations of what you do not understand; but let it be done at a
fitting moment and in fitting language. . . . Speak in refined
language, in clear utterance and gentle voice. Speak aptly to
the subject, as one who wishes to learn and to find the truth, not
as one whose aim is to quarrel and to conquer. . . . Learn
in your youth, when your food is prepared by others, while heart
is still free and unincumbered with cares, ere the memory is
weakened. . For the time will come when you will be willing to
learn but will be unable. Even if you be able, you will labor
much for little result; for your heart will lag behind your lips,
and when it does keep pace, it will soon forget. ... If you
find in the Law or the Prophets or the Sages a hard saying
which you cannot understand, which appears subversive of some
principle of the religion, or altogether absurd, stand fast by your
faith, and attribute the fault to your own want of intelligence.
Despise not your religion because you are unable to understand
one difficult matter. . . . Love truth and uprightness, — the

MOSES MAIMONIDES

ornaments of the soul, — and cleave to them; prosperity so ob-
tained is built on a sure rock. Keep firmly to your word; let
riot a legal contract or witness be more binding than your verbal
promise even privately made. Disdain reservation and subter-
fuges, sharp practices and evasions. Woe to him who builds
his house thereon! . . . Bring near those fhat are far off;
humble yourselves to the lowly and show them the light of your
countenance. In your joys make the desolate share, but put no
one to the blush by your gifts. ... I have seen the white
become black, the low brought still lower, families driven into
exile, princes deposed from their high estate, cities ruined, as-
semblies dispersed, all on account of quarrelsomeness. Glory in
forbearance, for in that is true strength and victory.
Speech, which distinguishes man from beasts, was a loving gift,
which man uses best in thinking, and thanking and praising God.
Ungraceful should we be to return evil for good, and to utter
slanders or falsehoods. . . . Eat not excessively or raven-
ously. Work before you eat, and rest afterwards. From a man's
behavior at a public meal you can discern his character. Often
have I returned hungry and thirsty to my house, because I was
afraid when I saw the disgraceful conduct of those around
me. . . . The total abstinence from wine is good, but I will
not lay this on you as an injunction. Yet break wine's power
with water, and drink it for nourishment, not for mere enjoy-
ment. ... At gambling the player always loses. Even if
he wins money, he is weaving a spider's web round himself.
. . . Dress as well as your means will allow, but spend on
your food less than you can afford. . . . Honor your wives,
for they are your honor. Withhold not discipline from them, and
let them not rule over you.

FROM THE < GUIDE OF THE PERPLEXED >
A PROOF OF THE UNITY OF GOD

IT HAS been demonstrated by proof that the whole existing
world is one organic body, all parts of which are connected
together; also, that the influences of the spheres above per-
vade the earthly substance and prepare it for its forms. Hence
it is impossible to assume that one deity be engaged in forming

9596

MOSES MAIMONIDES

one part, and another deity in forming another part, of that
organic body of which all parts are closely connected together.
A duality could only be imagined in this way: either that at
one time the one deity is active, the other at another time; or
that both act simultaneously, nothing being done except by both
together. The lirst hypothesis is certainly absurd, for many
reasons: if at the time the one deity be active the other could
also be active, there is no reason why one deity should then act
and the other not; if on the other hand it be impossible for the
one deity to act when the other is at work, there must be some
other cause [besides these deities] which [at a certain time]
enables the one to act and disables the other. [Such differ-
ence would not be caused by time,] since time is without change,
and the object of the action likewise remains one and the same
organic whole. Besides, if two deities existed in this way, both
would be subject to the relations of time, since their actions
would depend on time; they would also in the moment of act-
ing pass from potentiality to actuality, and require an agent for
such transition; their essence would besides include possibility
[of existence]. It is equally absurd to assume that both together
produce everything in existence, and that neither of them does
anything alone; for when a number of forces must be united for
a certain result, none of these forces acts of its own accord, and
none is by itself the immediate cause of that result, but their
union is the immediate cause. It has furthermore been proved
that the action of the Absolute cannot be due to a [an external]
cause. The union is also an act which presupposes a cause
effecting that union, and if that cause be one, it is undoubtedly
God; but if it also consists of a number of separate forces, a
cause is required for the combination of these forces, as in the
first case. Finally, one simple being must be arrived at, that is
the cause of the existence of the universe, which is one whole;
it would make no difference whether we assumed that the First
Cause had produced the universe by creatio ex nihilo, or whether
the universe co-existed' with the First Cause. It is thus clear
how we can prove the Unity of God from the fact that this
universe is one whole.

MOSES MAIMONIDES

AN ARGUMENT CONCERNING THE INCORPOREALITY OF GOD

9597

EVERY corporeal object is composed of matter and form (Prop,
xxii.); every compound of these two elements requires an agent
for effecting their combination. Besides, it is evident that a body
is divisible and has dimensions; a body is thus undoubtedly sub'
ject to accidents. Consequently nothing corporeal can be a unity,
because everything corporeal is either divisible or a compound,
— that is to say, it can logically be analyzed into two elements;
for a body can only be said to be a certain body when the dis-
tinguishing element is added to the corporeal substratum, and
must therefore include two elements: but it has been proved
that the Absolute admits of no dualism whatever.

Among those who believe in the existence of God, there are
found three different theories as regards the question whether
the universe is eternal or not.

First Theory. — Those who follow the Law of Moses our
teacher hold that the whole universe (i. e., everything except God)
has been brought by him into existence out of non-existence.
In the beginning God alone existed, and nothing else; neither
angels, nor spheres, nor the things that are contained within the
spheres existed. He then produced from nothing all existing
things such as they are, by his will and desire. Even time itself
is among the things created; for time depends on motion, —
i. e., on an accident in things which move, — and the things upon
whose motion time depends are themselves created beings, which
have passed from non-existence into existence. We say that God
existed before the creation of the universe, although the verb
(< existed }) appears to imply the notion of time ; we also believe
that he existed an infinite space of time before the universe was
created; but in these cases we do not mean time in its true sense.
We only use the term to signify something analogous or similar
to time. For time is undoubtedly an accident, and according to
our opinion, one of the created accidents, like blackness and
whiteness; it is not a quality, but an accident connected with
motion. This must be clear to all who imderstand what Aris-
totle has said on time and its real existence.

Second Theory. — The theory of all philosophers whose opin-
ions and works are known to us is this: It is impossible to
assume that God produced anything from nothing, or that he
reduces anything1 to nothing; that is to say, it is impossible that

MOSES MAIMONIDES

an object consisting of matter and form should be produced
when that matter is absolutely absent, or that it should be
destroyed in such a manner that that matter be absolutely no
longer in existence. To say of God that he can produce a thing
from nothing or reduce a thing to nothing is, according to
the opinion of these philosophers, the same as if we were to say
that he could cause one substance to have at the same time
two opposite properties, or produce another being like himself, or
change himself into a body, or produce a square the diagonal of
which should be equal to its side, or similar impossibilities. The
philosophers thus believe that it is no defect in the Supreme
Being that he does not produce impossibilities, for the nature of
that which is impossible is constant; it does not depend on the
action of an agent, and for this reason it cannot be changed.
Similarly there is, according to them, no defect in the greatness
of God when he is unable to produce a thing from nothing,
because they consider this as one of the impossibilities. They
therefore assume that a certain substance has coexisted with
God from eternity, in such a manner that neither God existed
without that substance nor the latter without G.od. But they do
not hold that the existence of that substance equals in rank that
of God; for God is the cause of that existence, and the substance
is in the same relation to God as the clay is to the potter, or
the iron to the smith: God can do with it what he pleases; at
one time he forms of it heaven and earth, at another time he
forms some other thing. Those who hold this view also assume
that the heavens are transient ; that they came into existence
though not from nothing, and may cease to exist although they
cannot be reduced to nothing. They are transient in the same
manner as the individuals among living beings, which are pro-
duced from some existing substance that remains in existence.
The process of genesis and destruction is, in the case of the
heavens, the same as in that of earthly beings.

Third Theory. — Viz., that of Aristotle, his followers and com-
mentators. Aristotle maintains, like the adherents of the second
theory, that a corporeal object cannot be produced without a cor-
poreal substance. He goes further, however, and contends that
the heavens are indestructible. For he holds that the universe
in its totality has never been different, nor will it ever change:
the heavens, which form the permanent element in the universe,
and are not subject to genesis and destruction, have always been

MOSES MAIMONIDES

9599

so; time and motion are eternal, permanent, and have neither
beginning nor end; the sublunary world, which includes the tran-
sient elements, has always been the same, because the materia
prima is itself eternal, and merely combines successively with
different forms, — when one form is removed another is assumed.
This whole arrangement, therefore, both above and here below, is
never disturbed or interrupted; and nothing is produced contrary
to the laws or the ordinary course of Nature. He further says —
though not in the same terms — that he considers it impossible
for God to change his will or conceive a new desire; that God
produced this universe in its totality by his will, but not from
nothing. Aristotle finds it as impossible to assume that God
changes his will or conceives a new desire as to believe that
he is non-existing or that his essence is changeable. Hence it
follows that this universe has always been the same in the past,
and will be the same eternally.

THE OBJECT OF LAW

THE general object of the Law is twofold: the well-being of
the soul and the well-being of the body. The well-being of the
soul is promoted by correct opinions communicated to the people
according to their capacity. Some of these opinions are there-
fore imparted in a plain form, others allegorically ; because certain
opinions are in their plain form too strong for the capacity of
the common people. The well-being of the body is established
by a proper management of the relations in which we live one
to another. This we can attain in two ways: first by removing
all violence from our midst; that is to say, that we do not do
every one as he pleases, desires, and is able to do, but every one
of us does that which contributes towards the common welfare.
Secondly, by teaching every one of us such good morals as must
produce a good social state.

Of these two objects, the former — the well-being of the soul,
or the communication of correct opinions — comes undoubtedly
first in rank; but the other — the well-being of the body, the gov-
ernment of the State, and the establishment of the best possible
relations among men — is anterior in nature and time. The lat-
ter object is required first; it is also treated [in the Law] most
carefully and most minutely, because the well-being of the soul
can only be obtained after that of the body has been secured.

9600

MOSES MAIMONIDES

For it has always been found that man has a double perfection:
the first perfection is that of the body, and the second perfec-
tion is that of the soul. The first consists in > the most healthy
condition of his material relations, and this is only possible
when man has all his wants supplied as they arise: if he has
his food and other things needful for his body, — e. g., shelter,
bath, and the like. But one man alone cannot procure all this;
it is impossible for a single man to obtain this comfort; it is only
possible in society, since man, as is well known, is by nature
social.

The second perfection of man consists in his becoming an
actually intelligent being ; i. e. , when he knows about the things
in existence all that a person perfectly developed is capable of
knowing. This second perfection certainly does not include any
action or good conduct, but only knowledge, which is arrived at
by speculation or established by research.

It is clear that the second and superior kind of perfection can
only be attained when the first perfection has been acquired; for
a person that is suffering from great hunger, thirst, heat, or cold,
cannot grasp an idea even if communicated by others, much less
can he arrive at it by his own reasoning. But when a person is
in possession of the first perfection, then he may possibly acquire
the second perfection, which is undoubtedly of a superior kind,
and is alone the source of eternal life. The true Law, which as
we said is one, and beside which there is no other Law, — viz.,
the Law of our teacher Moses, — has for its purpose to give us
the twofold perfection. It aims first at the establishment of good
mutual relations among men, by removing injustice and creating
the noblest feelings. In this way the people in every land are
enabled to stay and continue in one condition, and every one can
acquire his first perfection. Secondly, it seeks to train us in
faith, and to impart correct and true opinions when the intellect
is sufficiently developed. Scripture clearly mentions the twofold
perfection, and tells us that its acquisition is the object of all
Divine commandments. Cf. <(And the Lord commanded us to
do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good
always, that he might preserve us alive this day w (Deut. vi. 24).
Here the second perfection is first mentioned because it is of
greater importance; being, as we have shown, the ultimate aim
of man's existence. This perfection is expressed in the phrase
<(for our good always." You know the interpretation of our

MOSES MAIMONIDES

9601

sages: <(<that it may be well with thee ' (ibid., xxii. 7), —
namely, in the world that is all good; <and thou mayest prolong
thy days* (ibid.), — i. e., in the world that is all eternal. }> In the
same sense I explain the words (( for our good always w to mean
<(that we may come into the world that is all good and eternal,
where we may live permanently }> ; and the words (( that he might
preserve us alive this day}> I explain as referring to our first and
temporal existence, to that of our body,' which cannot be in a
perfect and good condition except by the co-operation of society,
as has been shown by us.

TRUE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD

AFTER a man has acquired the true knowledge of God, it
must be his aim to surrender his whole being to him and to have
his heart constantly filled with longing after him. Our intellect-
ual power, which emanates directly from God, joins us to him.
You have it in your power to strengthen that bond, or to weaken
it until it breaks. It will be strengthened if you love God above
all other things" and weakened if you prefer other things to him.
All religious acts, such as the reading of Scripture, praying, and
performing of ordinances, are only means to fill our mind with
the thought of God and free it from worldliness. If however
we pray with the motion of our lips and our face toward the
wall, but think all the while of our business; read the Law, and
think of the building of our house; perform ceremonies with our
limbs only, whilst our hearts are far from God, — then there is
no difference between these acts and the digging of the ground
or the hewing of wood.

SUPERFLUOUS THINGS

THE soul, when accustomed to superfluous things, acquires a
strong habit of desiring others which are neither necessary for
the preservation of the individual nor for that of the species.
This desire is without limit; whilst things which are necessary
are few and restricted within certain bounds. Lay this well to
heart, reflect on it again and again: that which is superfluous is
without end, and therefore the desire for it also without limit.
Thus you desire to have your vessels of silver, but gold vessels
are still better; others have even vessels studded with sapphires,
emeralds, or rubies. Those therefore who are ignorant of this
xvi — 601

9602

MOSES MAIMONIDES

truth, that the desire for superfluous things is without limit, are
constantly in trouble and pain. They expose themselves to great
dangers by sea voyages or in the service of kings. When they
thus meet with the consequences of their course, they complain of
the judgments of God; they go so far as to say that God's power
is insufficient, because he has given to this universe the proper-
ties which they imagine cause these evils.

EVIL THINGS CONTRASTED WITH GOOD THINGS

MEN frequently think that the evils in the world are more
numerous than the good things; many sayings and songs of the
nations dwell on this idea. They say that the good is found only
exceptionally, whilst evil things are numerous and lasting. The
origin of this error is to be found in the circumstance that men
judge of the whole universe by examining one single person,
believing that the world exists for that one person only. If
anything happens to him contrary to his expectation, forthwith
they conclude that the whole universe • is evil. 'All mankind at
present in existence form only an infinitesimal portion of the per-
manent universe. It is of great advantage that man should know
his station. Numerous evils to which persons are exposed are
due to the defects existing in the persons themselves. We seek
relief from our own faults; we suffer from evils which we inflict
on ourselves; and we ascribe them to God, who is far from con-
nected with them. As Solomon explained it, (< The foolishness of
man perverteth his way, and his heart fretteth against the Lord"
(Prov. xix. 3).

THOUGHT OF SINS

THERE is a well-known saying of our sages : <( The thoughts
about committing a sin are a greater evil than the sin itself.0
I can offer a good explanation of this strange dictum. When a
person is disobedient, this is due to certain accidents connected
with the corporal element in his constitution; for man sins only
by his animal nature, whereas thinking is a faculty connected
with his higher and essential being. A person who thinks sinful
thoughts, sins therefore by means of the nobler portion of his
self ; just as he who causes an ignorant slave to work unjustly,
commits a lesser wrong than he who forces a free man or a
prince to do menial labor. That which forms the true nature of

MOSES MAIMONIDES

9603

man, with all its properties and powers, should only be employed
in suitable work, — in endeavoring to join higher beings, — and
not to sink to the condition of lower creatures.

Low SPEECH CONDEMNED

You know we condemn lowness of speech, and justly so; for
the gift of speech is peculiar to man, and a boon which God
granted to him, that he may be distinguished from the rest of
living creatures. This gift, therefore, which God gave us in
order to enable us to perfect ourselves, to learn and to , teach,
must not be employed in doing that which is for us most degrad-
ing and disgraceful. We must not imitate the songs and tales of
ignorant and lascivious people. It may be suitable to them, but
it is "not fit for those who are told — <(And ye shall be unto me
a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation ® (Ex. xix. 6).

CONTROL BODILY DESIRES

MAN must have control over all bodily desires. He must
reduce them as much as possible, and only retain of them as
much as is indispensable. His aim must be the aim of man, as
man ; viz. , the formation and perfection of ideas, and nothing else.
The best and the sublimest among them is the idea which man
forms of God, angels, and the rest of the creation, according to
his capacity. Such men are always with God, and of them it is
said: <(Ye are princes, and all of you are children of the Most
High." When man possesses a good sound body, that does not
overpower nor disturb the equilibrium within him, he possesses
a Divine gift. A good constitution facilitates the rule of the
soul over the body; but it is not impossible to conquer a bad
constitution by training, and make it subservient to man's ulti-
mate destiny.

THE MORAL EQUIPOISE

IT is true that many pious men in ages gone by have broken
the universal rule, to select the just mean in all the actions of
life; at times they went to extremes. Thus they fasted often,
watched through the nights, abstained from flesh and wine, wore
sackcloth, lived among the rocks, and wandered in the deserts.
They did this, however, only when they considered it necessary
to restore their disturbed moral equipoise; or to avoid, in the

9604

MOSES MAIMONIDES

midst of men, temptations which at times were too strong for
them. These abnegations were for them means to an end, and
they forsook them as soon as that end was attained. Thought-
less men, however, regarded castigations as holy in themselves,
and imitated them without thinking of the intentions of their
examples. They thought thereby to reach perfection and to
approach to God. The fools! as if God hated the body and took
pleasure in its destruction. They did not consider how many
sicknesses of soul their actions caused. They are to be compared
to such as take dangerous medicines because they have seen
that experienced physicians have saved many a one from death
with them; so they ruin themselves. This is the meaning of the
cry of the Prophet Jeremiah: <(Oh that I had in the wilderness
a lodging-place of wayfaring men, that I might leave my people
and go from them."

9605

SIR HENRY MAINE

(1822-1888)

BY D. MACQ. MEANS

[ENRY JAMES SUMNER MAINE was born near Leighton on August
1 5th, 1822, and passed his first years in Jersey; afterward
removing. to England, where he was brought up exclusively
by his mother, a woman of superior talents. In 1829 he was entered
by his godfather — Dr. Sunnier, afterward Archbishop of Canterbury
— at Christ's Hospital, and in 1840 went as one of its exhibitioners to
Pembroke College, Cambridge. From the
very beginning his career was brilliant; and
after carrying off nearly all the academic
honors, he was made Regius Professor of
Civil Law at the early age of twenty-five.
In spite of a feeble constitution, which
made his life a prolonged struggle with ill-
ness, his voice was always notably strong,
and is described by one of his early hearers
as like a silver bell. His appearance was
striking, indicating the sensitive nervous
energy of which he was full. Such were
his spirits and disposition that he was a
charming companion, but it was hard to
draw him away from his reading. This

became eventually prodigious in extent, his power of seizing on the
essence of books and passing over what was immaterial being very
remarkable.

In 1847 he married his cousin, Jane Maine; and as it became
necessary to provide for new responsibilities, he took up the law as
a profession, and was called to the bar in 1850. Like so many other
great Englishmen of modern times, he devoted much time to writing
for the press, his first efforts appearing in the Morning Chronicle.
He wrote for the first number of the Saturday Review, and is said
to have suggested its name. His contributions were very numer-
ous; and were especially valued by the editor, John Douglas Cook,
although the present Lord Salisbury, Sir William Ha'jourt, Goldwin
Smith, Sir James Stephen, Walter Bagehot, and otner able writers

SIR HENRY MAINE

9606

SIR HENRY MAINE

were coadjutors. He practiced a little at the common-law bar; but
his health did not "permit him to go regularly on circuit, and he
soon went over to the equity branch of the profession. In 1852 the
Inns of Court appointed him reader in Roman law; and in 1861 the
results of this lectureship were given to the world in the publication
of ( Ancient Law.*

This splendid work made an epoch in the history of the study of
law. It is the finest example of the comparative method which the
present generation has seen. Some of its conclusions have been
proved erroneous by later scholars, but the value of the book remains
unimpaired. Apart from its graces of style, its peculiar success was
due to the author's power of re-creating the past; of introducing
the reader, as it were, to his own ancestors many centuries removed,
engaged in the actual transaction of legal business. It was altogether
fitting that one who had shown such distinguished capacity for under-
standing the thoughts and customs of primitive peoples should be
chosen as an administrator of the Indian Empire; and in 1862 Maine
accepted the law membership in the council of the Governor-General
— the office previously filled by Macaulay. Perhaps nowhere in the
world is so good work done with so little publicity as in such posi-
tions as this. It is inconceivable that any 'one except a historian or a
specialist should read Maine's Indian papers, and yet no one can take
them up without being struck with their high quality. So far as intel-
ligent government is concerned, there is no comparison between a
benevolent despot like Maine and a representative chosen by popular
suffrage.

On his return from India in 1869, Maine became professor of
jurisprudence at Oxford; and showed the results of his Indian expe-
riences in the lectures published in 1871, under the title < Village
Communities.* In 1875 he brought out the ( Early History of Institu-
tions. ' He became a member of the Indian Council, and resigning his
Oxford professorship, was chosen master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge;
numberless other honors being showered on him. In 1883 tne last of
the series of works begun with 'Ancient Law* appeared, — Disser-
tations on Early Law and Custom.* This was followed in 1885 by
Popular Government,* a work especially interesting to Americans as
criticizing their form of government from the aristocratical point of
view. In 1887 Maine succeeded Sir William Harcourt as professor
of international law at Cambridge; but delivered only one course of
lectures, which were published after his death without his final revis-
ion. He died February 3d, 1888, of apoplexy, leaving a widow and
two sons, one of whom died soon after his father. A memoir of
his life was prepared by Sir M. E. Grant Duff, with a selection of his
Indian speeches and minutes, and published in this country in 1892

SIR HENRY MAINE 9607

by Henry Holt & Co. It contains a fine photograph from Dickinson's
portrait, — enough evidence of itself to explain the mastery which
the English race has come to exercise over so large a part of the
earth.

Maine's style was distinguished by lucidity and elegance. He has
been justly compared with Montesquieu; but the progress of knowl-
edge gave him the advantage of more accurate scholarship. He
applied the theory of evolution to the development of human institu-
tions; yet no sentence ever written by him has been so often quoted
as that which recognized the immobility of the masses of mankind:
<( Except the blind forces of nature, nothing moves in this world
which is not Greek in its origin. }> In spite of his wonderful powers
of almost intuitive generalization, and of brilliant expression, he had
not the temperament of a poetical enthusiast. He was noted for his
caution in his career as a statesman, and the same quality marked
all his work. As Sir F. Pollock said, he forged a new and lasting
bond between jurisprudence and anthropology, and made jurispru-
dence a study of the living growth of human society through all its
stages. But those who are capable of appreciating his work in India
will perhaps consider it his greatest achievement; for no man has
done so much to determine what Indian law should be, and thus to
shape the institutions of untold millions of human beings.

THE BEGINNINGS OF THE MODERN LAWS OF REAL PROPERTY

From Essay on < The Effects of Observation of India on Modern European
Th ought, > in < Village Communities in the East and West*

WHENEVER a corner is lifted up of the veil which hides from
us the primitive condition of mankind, even of such parts
of it as we know to have been destined to civilization,
there are two positions, now very familiar to us, which seem to
be signally falsified by all we are permitted to see: All men are
brothers, and All men are equal. The scene before us is rather
that which the animal world presents to the mental eye of those
who have the courage to bring home to themselves the facts
answering to the memorable theory of Natural Selection. Each

9608

SIR HENRY MAINE

fierce little community is perpetually at war with its neighbor,
tribe with tribe, village with village. The never-ceasing attacks
of the strong on the weak end in the manner expressed by the
monotonous formula which so often recurs in the pages of Thu-
cydides, — "They put the men to the sword; the women and
children they sold into slavery. » Yet even amid all this cruelty
and carnage, we find the germs of ideas which have spread over
the world. There is still a place and a sense in which men are
brothers and equals. The universal belligerency is the belliger-
ency of one total group, tribe, or village, with another; but in
the interior of the groups the regimen is one not of conflict and
confusion, but rather of ultra-legality. The men who composed
the primitive communities believed themselves to be kinsmen
in the most literal sense of the word; and surprising as it may
seem, there are a multitude of indications that in one stage of
thought they must have regarded themselves as equals. When
these primitive bodies first make their appearance as land-owners,
as claiming an exclusive enjoyment in a definite area of land,
not only do their shares of the soil appear to have been ori-
ginally equal, but a number of contrivances survive for preserv-
ing the equality, of which the most frequent is the periodical
redistribution of the tribal domain. The facts collected suggest
one conclusion, which may be now considered as almost proved
to demonstration. Property in land, as we understand it, — that
is, several ownership, ownership by individuals or by groups not
larger than families, — is a more modern institution than joint
property or co-ownership; that is, ownership in common by large
groups of men originally kinsmen, and still, wherever they are
found (and they are still found over a great part of the world),
believing or assuming themselves to be, in some sense, of kin to
one another. Gradually, and probably under the influence of a
great variety of causes, the institution familiar to us, individual
property in land, has arisen from the dissolution of the ancient
co-ownership.

There are other conclusions from modern inquiry which ought
to be stated less confidently, and several of them only in nega-
tive form. Thus, wherever we can observe the primitive groups
still surviving to our day, we find that competition has very fee-
ble play in their domestic transactions; competition, that is, in
exchange and in the acquisition of property. This phenomenon,
with several others, suggests that competition, that prodigious

SIR HENRY MAINE

9609

social force of which the action is measured by political econ-
omy, is of relatively modern origin. Just as the conceptions
of human brotherhood, and in a less degree of human equality,
appear to have passed beyond the limits of the primitive com-
munities and to have spread themselves in a highly diluted form
over the mass of mankind, — so, on the other hand, competition
in exchange seems to be the universal belligerency of the ancient
world which has penetrated into the interior of the ancient groups
of blood relatives. It is the regulated private war of ancient
society gradually broken up into indistinguishable atoms. So far
as property in land is concerned, unrestricted competition in pur-
chase and exchange has a far more limited field of action, even
at this moment, than an Englishman or an American would sup-
pose. The view of land as merchantable property, exchangeable
like a horse or an ox, seems to be not only modern but even
now distinctively Western. It is most unreservedly accepted in
the United States; with little less reserve in England and France;
but as we proceed through Eastern Europe it fades gradually
away, until in Asia it is wholly lost.

I cannot do more than hint at other conclusions which are
suggested by recent investigation. We may lay down, I think at
least provisionally, that in the beginning of the history of owner-
ship there was no such broad distinction as we now commonly
draw between political and proprietary power, — between the
power which gives the right to tax and the power which confers
the right to exact rent. It would seem as if the greater forms
of landed property now existing represented political sovereignty
in a condition of decay, while the small property of most of the
world has grown — not exclusively, as has been vulgarly supposed
hitherto, out of the precarious possessions of servile classes, but —
out of the indissoluble association of the status of freeman with
a share in the land of the community to which he belonged. I
think, again, that it is possible we may have to revise our ideas
of the relative antiquity of the objects of enjoyment which we
call movables and immovables, real property and personal prop-
erty. Doubtless the great bulk, of movables came into existence
after land had begun to be appropriated by groups of men; but
there is now much reason for suspecting that some of these com-
modities were severally owned before this appropriation, and that
they exercised great influence in dissolving the primitive collect-
ive ownership.

9610

SIR HENRY MAINE

It is unavoidable that positions like these, stated as they can
cnly be stated here, should appear to some paradoxical, to others
unimportant. There are a few, perhaps, who may conceive a sus-
picion that if property as we now understand it — that is, several
property — be shown to be more modern not only than the human
race (which was long ago assumed), but than ownership in com-
mon (which is only beginning to be suspected), some advantage
may be gained by those assailants of the institution itself whose
doctrines from time to time cause a panic in modern Continental
society. I do not myself think so, It is not the business of the
scientific historical inquirer to assert good or evil of any particu-
lar institution. He deals with its existence and development, not
with its expediency. But one conclusion he may properly draw
from the facts bearing on the subject before us. Nobody is at
liberty to attack several property and to say at the same time
that he values civilization. The history of the two cannot be dis-
entangled. Civilization is nothing more than a name for the old
order of the Aryan world, dissolved but perpetually reconstituting
itself under a vast variety of solvent influences, of which infi-
nitely the most powerful have been those which have slowly,
and in some parts of the world much less perfectly than others,
substituted several property for collective ownership.

IMPORTANCE OF A KNOWLEDGE OF ROMAN LAW: AND THE
EFFECT OF THE CODE NAPOLEON

From ( Roman Law and Legal Education,* in ( Village Communities in the

East and West>

IF IT were worth our while to inquire narrowly into the causes
which have led of late years to the revival of interest in the
Roman civil law, we should probably end in attributing its
increasing popularity rather to some incidental glimpses of its
value, which have been gained by the English practitioner in the
course of legal business, than to any widely diffused or far reach-
ing appreciation of its importance as an instrument of knowledge.
It is most certain that the higher the point of jurisprudence
which has to be dealt with, the more signal is always the assist-
ance derived by the English lawyer from Roman law; and the
higher the mind employed upon the question, the more unquali-
fied is its admiration of the system by which its perplexities have

SIR HENRY MAINE 96n

been disentangled. But the grounds upon which the study of
Roman jurisprudence is to be defended are by no means such as
to be intelligible only to the subtlest intellects, nor do they await
the occurrence of recondite points of law in order to disclose
themselves. It is believed that the soundness of many of them
will be recognized as soon as they are stated; and to these it is
proposed to call attention in the present essay.

The historical connection between the' Roman jurisprudence
and our own appears to be now looked upon as furnishing one
very strong reason for increased attention to the civil law of
Rome. The fact, of course, is not now to be questioned. The
vulgar belief that the English common law was indigenous in all
its parts was always so easily refuted, by the most superficial
comparison of the text of Bracton and Fleta with the Corpus
Juris^ that the honesty of the historians who countenanced it
can only be defended by alleging the violence of their preju-
dices; and now that the great accumulation of fragments of ante-
Justinianean compendia, and the discovery of the MS. of Gaius,
have increased our acquaintance with the Roman law in the only
form in which it can have penetrated into Britain, the suspicion
of a partial earlier filiation amounts almost to a certainty. The
fact of such a filiation has necessarily the highest interest for the
legal antiquarian, and it is of value besides for its effect on some
of the coarser prepossessions of English lawyers. But too much
importance should not be attached to it. It has ever been the
case in England that every intellectual importation we have
received has been instantly colored by the peculiarities of our
national habits and spirit. A foreign jurisprudence interpreted
by the old English common-lawyers would soon cease to be for-
eign, and the Roman law would lose its distinctive character with
even greater rapidity than any other set of institutions. It will
be easily understood that a system like the laws of Rome, distin-
guished above all others for its symmetry and its close correspond-
ence with fundamental rules, would be effectually metamorphosed
by a very slight distortion of its parts, or by the omission of one
or two governing principles. Even though, therefore, it be true —
and true it certainly is — that texts of Roman law have been
worked at all points into the foundations of our jurisprudence, it
does not follow from that fact that our knowledge of English
law would be materially improved by the study of the ( Corpus
Juris*; and besides, if too much stress be laid on the historical

9612

SIR HENRY MAINE

connection between the systems, it will be apt to encourage one
of the most serious errors into which the inquirer into the phi-
losophy of law can fall. It is not because our own jurisprudence
and that of Rome were once alike that they ought to be studied
together; it is because they will be alike. It is because all laws,
however dissimilar in their infancy, tend to resemble each other
in their maturity; and because we in England are slowly, and
perhaps unconsciously or unwillingly, but still steadily and cer-
tainly, accustoming ourselves to the same modes of legal thought,
and to the same conceptions of legal principle, to which the
Roman jurisconsults had attained after centuries of accumulated
experience and unwearied cultivation.

The attempt, however, to explain at length why the flux and
change which our law is visibly undergoing furnish the strongest
reasons for studying a body of rules so mature and so highly
refined as that contained in the ( Corpus Juris, y would be nearly
the same thing as endeavoring to settle the relation of the Roman
law to the science of jurisprudence; and that inquiry, from its
great length and difficulty, it would be obviously absurd to prose-
cute within the limits of an essay like the present. But there is
a set of considerations of a different nature, and equally forcible
in their way, which cannot be too strongly impressed on all who
have the control of legal or general education. The point which
they tend to establish is this: the immensity of the ignorance to
which we are condemned by ignorance of Roman law. It may be
doubted whether even the best educated men in England can
fully realize how vastly important an element is Roman law in
the general mass of human knowledge, and how largely it enters
into and pervades and modifies all products of human thought
which are not exclusively English. Before we endeavor to give
some distant idea of the extent to which this is true, we must
remind the reader that the Roman law is not a system of cases,
like our own. It is a system of which the nature may, for prac-
tical purposes though inadequately, be described by saying that
it consists of principles, and of express written rules. In Eng-
land, the labor of the lawyer is to extract from the precedents a
formula, which while covering them will also cover the state- of
facts to be adjudicated upon; and the task of rival advocates is,
from the same precedents or others to elicit different formulas
of equal apparent applicability. Now, in Roman law no such use
is made of precedents. The Corpus Juris, > as may be seen at a

SIR HENRY MAINE

9613

glance, contains a great number of what our English lawyers
would term cases; but then they are in no respect sources of
rules — they are instances of their application. They are, as it
were, problems solved by authority in order to throw light on the
rule, and to point out how it should be manipulated and applied.
How it was that the Roman law came to assume this form so
much sooner and more completely than our own, is a question
full of interest, and it is one of the first to which the student
should address himself; but though the prejudices of an English-
man will probably figure to him a jurisprudence thus constituted
as, to say the least, anomalous, it is nevertheless quite as readily
conceived, and quite as natural to the constitution of our own
system. In proof of this, it may be remarked that the English
common law was clearly conceived by its earliest expositors as
wearing something of this character. It was regarded as existing
somewhere in the form of a symmetrical body of express rules,
adjusted to definite principles* The knowledge of the system,
however, in its full amplitude and proportions, was supposed to be
confined to the breasts of the judges and the lay public, and the
mass of the legal profession were only permitted to discern its
canons intertwined with the facts of adjudged cases. Many traces
of this ancient theory remain in the language of our judgments
and forensic arguments; and among them we may perhaps place
the singular use of the word (< principle }> in the sense of a legal
proposition elicited from the precedents by comparison and induc-
tion.

The proper business of a Roman jurisconsult was therefore
confined to the interpretation and application of express written
rules; processes which must of course be to some extent em-
ployed by the professors of every system of laws — of our own
among others, when we attempt to deal with statute law. But
the great space which they filled at Rome has no counterpart
in English practice; and becoming, as they did, the principal
exercise of a class of men characterized as a whole by extraordi-
nary subtlety and patience, and in individual cases by extraor-
dinary genius, they were the means of producing results which
the English practitioner wants centuries of attaining. We who
speak without shame — occasionally with something like pride — of
our ill success in construing statutes, have at our hand nothing
distantly resembling the appliances which the Roman jurispru-
dence supplies, partly by definite canons and partly by appropriate

9614 SIR HENRY MAINE

examples, for the understanding and management of written law.
It would not be doing more than justice to the methods of inter-
pretation invented by the Roman lawyers, if we were to com-
pare the power which they give over their subject-matter to
the advantage which the geometrician derives from mathematical
analysis in discussing the relations of space. By each of these
helps, difficulties almost insuperable become insignificant, and pro-
cesses nearly interminable are shortened to a tolerable compass.
The parallel might be carried still further, and we might insist on
the special habit of mind which either class of mental exercise
induces. Most certainly nothing can be more peculiar, special, and
distinct than the bias of thought, the modes of reasoning, and
the habits of illustration, which are given by a training in the
Roman law. No tension of mind or length of study which even
distantly resembles the labor of mastering English jurisprudence
is necessary to enable the student to realize these peculiarities
of mental view; but still they cannot be acquired without some
effort, and the question is, whether the effort which they demand
brings with it sufficient reward. We can only answer by endeav-
oring to point out that they pervade whole departments of thought
and inquiry of which some knowledge is essential to every law-
yer, and to every man of decent cultivation. . . .

It may be confidently asserted, that if the English lawyer only
attached himself to the study of Roman law long enough to mas-
ter the technical phraseology and to realize the leading legal con-
ceptions of the < Corpus Juris, y he would approach those questions
of foreign law to which our courts have repeatedly to address
themselves, with an advantage which no mere professional acumen
acquired by the exclusive practice of our own jurisprudence could
ever confer on him. The steady multiplication of legal systems
borrowing the entire phraseology, adopting the principles, and
appropriating the greater part of the rules, of Roman jurispru-
dence, is one of the most singular phenomena of our day, and far
more worthy of attention than the most showy manifestations of
social progress. This gradual approach of Continental Europe to
a uniformity of municipal law dates unquestionably from the first
French Revolution, Although Europe, as is well known, formerly
comprised a number of countries and provinces which governed
themselves by the written Roman law, interpolated with feudal
observances, there does not seem to be any evidence that the
institutions of these localities enjoyed any vogue or favor beyond

SIR HENRY MAINE

9615

their boundaries. Indeed, in the earlier part of the last century,
there may be traced among the educated men of the Continent
something of a feeling in favor of English law; a feeling pro-
ceeding, it is to be feared, rather from the general enthusiasm
for English political institutions which was then prevalent, than
founded on any very accurate acquaintance with the rules of our
jurisprudence. Certainly,, as respects France in particular, there
were no visible symptoms of any general preference for the insti-
tutions of the pays de droit tcrit as 'opposed to the provinces in
which customary law was observed. But then came the French
Revolution, and brought with it the necessity of preparing a gen-
eral code for France one and indivisible. Little is known of the
special training through which the true authors of this work had
passed; but in the form which it ultimately assumed, when pub-
lished as the Code Napoleon, it may be described without great
inaccuracy as a compendium of the rules of Roman law then
practiced in France, cleared of all feudal admixture; such rules,
however, being in all cases taken with the extensions given to
them and the interpretations put upon them by one or two emi-
nent French jurists, and particularly by Pothier. The French
conquests planted this body of laws over the whole extent of the
French empire, and the kingdoms immediately dependent upon it;
and it is incontestable that it took root with extraordinary quick-
ness and tenacity. The highest tribute to the French codes is
their great and lasting popularity with the people, the .lay public,
of the countries into which they have been introduced. How
much weight ought to be attached to this symptom, our own ex-
perience should teach us; which surely shows us how thoroughly
indifferent in general is the mass of the public to the particu-
lar rules of civil life by which it may be governed, and how
extremely superficial are even the most energetic movements in
favor of the amendment of the law. At the fall of the Bona-
partist empire in 1815, most of the restored governments had
the strongest desire to expel the intrusive jurisprudence which
had substituted itself for the ancient customs of the land. It was
found, however, that the people prized it as the most precious of
possessions: the attempt to subvert it was persevered in in very
few instances, and in most of them the French codes were
restored after a brief abeyance. And not only has the observance
of these laws been confirmed in almost all the countries which
ever enjoyed them, but they have made their way into numerous

9616

SIR HENRY MAINE

other communities, and occasionally in the teeth of the most for-
midable political obstacles. So steady, indeed, and so resistless
has been the diffusion of this Romanized jurisprudence, either in
its original or in a slightly modified form, that the civil law of
the whole Continent is clearly destined to be absorbed and lost
in it. It is, too, we should add, a very vulgar error to suppose
that the civil part of the codes has only been found suited to a
society so peculiarly constituted as that of France. With alter-
ations and additions, mostly directed to the enlargement of the
testamentary power on one side and to the conservation of en-
tails and primogeniture on the other, they have been admitted
into countries whose social condition is as unlike that of France
as is possible to conceive.

9617

XAVIER DE MAISTRE

(1764-1852)

lo STUDENTS of French literature the name De Maistre suggests
first, Joseph Marie de Maistre, — brilliant philosopher, stern
and eloquent critic, vain opponent of revolutionary ideas;
but the general reader is far better acquainted with his younger
brother Xavier. He was a somewhat da'shing military personage,
a striking contrast to his austere senior, loving the aesthetic side of
life: an amateur artist, a reader of many books, who on occasion
could write charmingly.

Born in Chambery in 1764, of French
descent, he entered the Sardinian army,
where he remained until the annexation of
Savoy to France; when, finding himself an
exile, he joined his brother, then envoy to
St. Petersburg. Later he entered the Rus-
sian army; married in Russia, and lived
there to the good old age of eighty-eight.

Perhaps the idea of authorship would
never have occurred to the active soldier
but for a little mishap. A love affair led
to a duel; and he was arrested and impris-
oned at Turin for forty-two days. A result
of this leisure was the ( Voyage autour de

ma Chambre > (Journey round my Room) ; a series of half playful, half
philosophic sketches, whose delicate humor and sentiment suggest the
influence of Laurence Sterne. Later on, he submitted the manuscript
to his much-admired elder brother, who liked it so well that he had
it published by way of pleasant surprise. He was less complimentary
to a second and somewhat similar work, ( L'Expedition Nocturne >
(The Nocturnal Expedition), and his advice delayed its publication
for several years.

Xavier de Maistre was not a prolific writer, and all his work is
included in one small volume. Literature was merely his occasional
pastime, indulged in as a result of some chance stimulus. A conver-
sation with fellow-officers suggests an old experience, and he goes
home and writes ( Le Lepreux de la Cite d'Aoste } (The Leper of
Aoste), a pathetic story, strong in its unstudied sincerity of expression.

XAVIER DE MAISTRE

9618

XAVIER DE MAISTRE

Four years later he tells another little tale, <Les Prisonniers du
Caucase y (The Prisoners of the Caucasus), a stirring bit of adventure.

His last story, < La Jeune Siberienne > (The Siberian Girl), best
known as retold and weakened by Madame Cottin, is a striking pre-
monition of later realism. There is no forcing the pathetic effect
in the history of the heroic young daughter who braves a long and
terrible journey to petition the Czar for her father's release from
Siberian exile.

The charm of De Maistre's style is always in the ease and sim-
plicity of the telling. In his own time he was very popular; and his
work survives with little loss of interest to-day.

THE TRAVELING-COAT
From the <Journey round My Room.> Copyright 1871, by Hurd & Houghton

I PUT on my traveling-coat, after having examined it with a
complacent eye; and forthwith resolved to write a chapter

ad hoc, that I might make it known to the reader.

The form and usefulness of these garments being pretty gen-
erally known, I will treat specially of their influence upon the
minds of travelers.

My winter traveling-coat is made of the warmest and softest
stuff I could meet with. It envelops me entirely from head to
foot; and when I am in my arm-chair, with my hands in my
pockets, I am very like the statue of Vishnu one sees in the
pagodas of India.

You may, if you will, tax me with prejudice when I assert
the influence a traveler's costume exercises upon its wearer. At
any rate, I can confidently affirm with regard to this matter that
it would appear to me as ridiculous to take a single step of my
journey round my room in uniform, with my sword at my side,
as it would to go forth into the world in my dressing-gown.
Were I to find myself in full military dress, not only should
I be unable to proceed with my journey, but I really believe I
should not be able to read what I have written about my travels,
still less to understand it.

Does this surprise you ? Do we not every day meet with peo-
ple who fancy they are ill because they are unshaven, or because
some one has thought they have looked poorly and told them
so ? Dress has such influence upon men's minds that there are
valetudinarians who think themselves in better health than usual

XAVIER DE MAISTRE

9619

when they have on a new coat and well-powdered wig. They
deceive the public and themselves by their nicety about dress,
until one finds some fine morning they have died in full fig, and
their death startle? everybody.

And in the class of men among whom I live, how many there
are who, finding themselves clothed in uniform, firmly believe
they are officers, until the unexpected appearance of the enemy
shows them their mistake. And more than this, if it be the
king's good pleasure to allow one of them to add to his coat a
certain trimming, he straightway believes himself to be a general;
and the whole army gives him the title without any notion of
making fun of him! So great an influence has a coat upon the
human imagination!

The following illustration will show still further the truth of
my assertion: —

It sometimes happened that they forgot to inform the Count

de some days beforehand of the approach of his turn to

mount guard. Early one morning, on the very day on which this
duty fell to the Count, a corporal awoke him and announced the
disagreeable news. But the idea of getting up there and then,
putting on his gaiters, and turning out without having thought
about it the evening before, so disturbed him that he preferred
reporting himself sick and staying at home all day. So he put
on his dressing-gown and sent away his barber. This made him
look pale and ill, and frightened his wife and family. He really
did feel a little poorly.

He told every one .he was not very well, — partly for the sake
Z)f appearances, and partly because he positively believed himself
to be indisposed. Gradually the influence of the dressing-gown
began to work. The slops he was obliged to take upset his
stomach. His relations and friends sent to ask after him. He
was soon quite ill enough to take to his bed.

In the evening Dr. Ranson found his pulse hard and feverish,
and ordered him to be bled next day.

If the campaign had lasted a month longer, the sick man's
case would have been past cure.

Now, who can doubt about the influence of traveling-coats

upon travelers, if he reflect that poor Count de thought

more than once that he was about to perform a journey to the
other world for having inopportunely donned his dressing-gown
in this ?

9626 XAVIER DE MAISTRE

A FRIEND
From the < Journey round My Room.* Copyright 1871, by Kurd & Houghton

I HAD a friend. Death took him from me. He was snatched
away at the beginning of his career, at the moment when

his friendship had become a pressing need to my heart. We
supported one another in the hard toil of war. We had but
one pipe between us. We drank out of the same cup. We slept
beneath the same tent. And amid our sad trials, the spot where
we lived together became to us a new fatherland. I had seen
him exposed to all the perils of a disastrous war. Death seemed
to spare us to each other. His deadly missiles were exhausted
around my friend a thousand times over without reaching him.
but this was but to make his loss more painful to me. The
tumult of war, and the enthusiasm which possesses the soul at
the sight of danger, might have prevented his sighs from pier-
cing my heart, while his death would have been useful to his
country and damaging to the enemy. Had he died thus, I should
have mourned him less. But to lose him amid the joys of our
winter-quarters; to see him die at the moment when he seemed
full of health, and when our intimacy was rendered closer by
rest and tranquillity, — ah, this was a blow from which I can
never recover!

But his memory lives in my heart, and there alone. He is
forgotten by those who surrounded him and who have replaced
him. And this makes his loss the more sad to me.

Nature, in like manner indifferent to the fate of individuals^
dons her green spring robe, and decks herself in all her beauty
near the cemetery where he rests. The trees cover themselves
with foliage, and intertwine their branches; the birds warble under
the leafy sprays; the insects hum among the blossoms: every-
thing breathes joy in this abode of death.

And in the evening, when the moon shines in the sky, and I
am meditating in this sad place, I hear the grasshopper, hidden
in the grass that covers the silent grave of my friend, merrily
pursuing his unwearied song. The unobserved destruction of
human beings, as well as all their misfortunes, are counted for
nothing in the grand total of events.

The death of an affectionate man who breathes his last sur-
rounded by his afflicted friends, and that of a butterfly killed in
a flower's cup by the chill air of morning, are but two similar

XAVIER DE MAISTRE

epochs in the course of nature. Man is but a phantom, a
shadow, a mere 'vapor that melts into the air.

But daybreak begins to whiten the sky. The gloomy thoughts
that troubled me vanish with the darkness, and hope awakens
again in my heart. No! He who thus suffuses the east with
light has not made it to shine upon my eyes only to plunge me
into the night of annihilation. He who has spread out that vast
horizon, who raised those lofty mountains whose icy tops the sun
is even now gilding, is also he who made my heart to beat and
my mind to think.

No! My friend is not annihilated. Whatever may be the
barrier that separates us, I shall see him again. My hopes are
based on no mere syllogism. The flight of an insect suffices to
persuade me. And often the prospect of the surrounding coun-
try, the perfume of the air, and an indescribable charm which
is spread around me, so raise my thoughts, that an invincible
proof of immortality forces itself upon my soul, and fills it to the
full.

THE LIBRARY
From the ( Journey round My Room*: Copyright 1871, by Hurd & Houghton

I PROMISED to give a dialogue between my soul and the OTHER.
But there are some chapters which elude me, as it were; or

rather, there are others which flow from my pen nolens volens,
and derange my plans. Among these is one about my library;
and I will make it as short as I can. Our forty-two days will
soon be ended ; and even were it not so, a similar period would
not suffice to complete the description of the rich country in
which I travel so pleasantly.

My library, then, is composed of novels, if I must make the
confession — of novels and a few choice poets.

As if I had not troubles enough of my own, I share those of
a thousand imaginary personages, and I feel them as acutely as
my own. How many tears have I shed for that poor Clarissa,
and for Charlotte's lover!

But if I go out of my way in .search of unreal afflictions, I
find in return such virtue, kindness, and disinterestedness in this
imaginary world, as I have never yet found united in the real
world around me. I meet with a woman after my heart's desire,

9622

XAVIER DE MAISTRE

free from whim, lightness, and affectation. I say nothing about
beauty: this I can leave to my imagination, and picture her fault-
lessly beautiful. And then closing the book, which no longer
keeps pace with my ideas, I take the fair one by the hand, and
we travel together over a country a thousand times more delight-
ful than Eden itself. What painter could represent the fairyland
in which I have placed the goddess of my heart? What poet
could ever describe the lively and manifold sensations I experi-
ence in those enchanted regions ?

How often have I cursed that Cleveland, who is always em-
barking upon new troubles which he might very well avoid! I
cannot endure that book, with its long list of calamities. But if
I open it by way of distraction, I cannot help devouring it to
the end.

For how could I leave that poor man among the Abaquis ?
What would become of him in the hands of those savages ? Still
less dare I leave him in his attempt to escape from captivity.

Indeed, I so enter into his sorrows, I am so interested in him
and in his unfortunate family, that the sudden appearance of the
ferocious Ruintons makes my hair stand on end. When I read
that passage a cold perspiration covers me; and my fright is as
lively and real as if I were going to be roasted and eaten by the
monsters myself.

When I have had enough of tears and love, I turn to some
poet, and set out again for a new world.

9623

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

(i849-)

IILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK is the interesting product of the
interesting period in which he was educated and the inter-
esting conditions of his social life. Well born, well bred,
well fed, well read, well supplied with luxuries, well disciplined at the
wicket and the oar, the son of a clergyman of the Church of England
(Rev. Roger Mallock) and the nephew of James Anthony and Richard
Hurrell Froude, he was educated at home by private tutors till he
entered Balliol College, Oxford. There he took a second class in final
classicals, and in 1871 the Newdigate poet-
ical prize, the subject of his poem being
<The Isthmus of Suez.'

In 1876 he published <The New Repub-
lic, * which first appeared in a magazine.
The first impression of the book is its
audacity, the second its cleverness; but
when one has gotten well into its leisurely
pages, and has found himself in what seems
to be the veritable company of Huxley,
Matthew Arnold, Ruskin, Professor Clifford,
Walter Pater, Professor Jowett, and Mr.
Tyndall, he is penetrated with the convic-
tion that the work is the perfected flower
of the art of delicate characterization. The

parodies are so good that they read like reminiscences enlivened with
the lightest touch of extravaganza.

The sub-title of < The New Republic > — < Culture, Faith, and Phi-
losophy in an English Country-House > — indicates its plan. A young
man of fortune and distinction assembles at his villa a party of vis-
itors, who under thin disguises represent the leading thinkers of the
day. The company plays at constructing an ideal republic, which
is to be the latest improvement on Plato's commonwealth. To facil-
itate the discussion, the host writes the titles of the subjects to be
talked about on the back of the menus of their first dinner: they
prove to be such seductive themes as <The Aim of Life,* ( Society,
Art, and Literature,* ( Riches and Civilization, y and (The Present and
the Future. J

In the expression of opinion that follows, the peculiarities and
inconsistencies of the famous personages are hit off with delicious

WILLIAM H. MALLOCK

9624 WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

appositeness. The first principle of the proposed New Republic is to
destroy all previous republics. Mr. Storks ( Professor Huxley ) elimi-
nates a conscious directing intelligence from the world of matter.
Mr. Stockton (Professor Tyndall) eliminates the poetry and romance
of the imagination, substituting those of the wonders of science.
The materialist, Mr. Saunders (Professor Clifford), eliminates the <(foul
superstition >} of the existence of God and the scheme of salvation
through the merits of Christ. Mr. Luke (Matthew Arnold) who is
represented as mournfully strolling about the lawn in the moonlight,
reciting his own poems, — poems which puzzle us in their oscillation
between mirth and moralizing, till an italicized line warns us to be
wary, — Mr. Luke eliminates the middle classes. Mr. Rose (Walter
Pater) eliminates religious belief as a serious verity, but retains it
as an artistic finish and decorative element in life. Dr. Jenkinson
(Professor Jowett) in a sermon which he might have preached in
Balliol Chapel, and his habitual audience have heard without the
lifting of an eyebrow, eliminates the <(bad taste w of conviction on
any subject. Finally Mr. Herbert (Mr. Ruskin), descending upon the
reformers in a burst of vituperation, eliminates the upper classes,
because they neither have themselves nor furnish the lower orders
any object to live for. The outcome of the discussion is predicted on
the title-page: —

«A11 is jest and ashes and nothingness; for all things that are, are of
folly.»

So much space has been given to Mr. Mallock's first book because
it is representative of his quality, and discloses the line of his sub-
sequent thinking. Only once again does he permit himself the
relaxation of an irresponsible and clever parody, — that on Positivism
in *The New Paul and Virginia *; wherein the germ revealed in the
sketches of Huxley and his fellow scientists is more fully developed,
to the disedification of the serious-minded, who complain that the
representatives of Prometheus are dragged down to earth.

But the shades of the mighty whom he ridiculed have played a
curious trick on Mr. Mallock. As Emerson says of the soul of the
dead warrior, which, entering the breast of the conqueror, takes up
its abode there, — so the wraiths of doubt, materialism, discontent,
Philistinism, and the many upsetting emotions which the clever satir-
ist disposed of with a jest, entered his own hypersensitive organism,
and, for all the years succeeding, sent him about among the men
of his generation sharing with Ruskin the burden of their salvation.
Nor does he propose to let any sense of his own limitations as a
prophet interfere with the delivery of his message. In a volume of
several hundred pages he asks a nineteenth-century audience, < Is
Life Worth Living ? J Can we, he demands in substance, like his own

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9625

Mr. Herbert, go on buying blue china and enjoying the horse-show
and the ><( season, * and our little trips to Paris, and first editions in
rare bindings, if we are not sure that these tastes will be gratified
in another world ? In his mind, the reply to this question resolves
itself into the necessity for a final authority, — an authority which he
himself discovers in the voice of the Church of Rome.

He is an indefatigable worker. As a novelist he belongs to the
sentimental school, in which a craving for sympathy and a marked
tendency to reject conventional standards characterizes all his men
and many of his women. Because he has written them, his stories
are never dull; they abound in epigram, sketches of character, and
wise reflections: but the plots are slightly woven and hang at loose
ends, while a denouement is as deliberately ignored as if the author
were a pupil of Zola. His novels or romances are <A Romance of
the Nineteenth Century,) (The Old Order Changeth,) (A Human Doc-
ument,) (The Heart of Life,) and (The Veil of the Temple) (1904).

As an essayist he is widely read. He was one of the famous
five who took part in the Christianity vs. Agnosticism controversy, in
which Bishop Wace and Mr. Huxley were the champions. He has
written two volumes of poems, translated Lucretius; and his varied
magazine articles, collected in book form, have been published under
the titles of ( Social Equality > (London, 1882), ( Property, Progress,
and Poverty) (1884), (Classes and Masses; or, Wealth and Wages
in the United Kingdom) (1896), (Aristocracy and Evolution) (1898),
(Doctrine and Doctrinal Disruption) (1900), ( Critical Examinations of
Socialism) (1907), (The Nation as a Business Firm) (1910), etc.

In these volumes, mostly on social topics, Mr. Mallock presents
himself as a sedate Conservative, committed to hereditary legisla-
tion, the sacredness of the game laws, the Doomsday Book, and the
rest of medisevalism. Against democratic theories concerning social
equality, labor, and property, he sets up the counter proposition that
labor is not the cause of wealth, and of itself would be powerless to
produce it. As for social equality, he sees that diversity of station is
a part of the framework that holds society together.

These books are written in a serious manner. But it is an axiom that
the successful advocate must give the impression that he himself has
no doubt of his cause. This Mr. Mallock almost never does. The
more positive his plea, the more visible between the lines is the
mocking, unconvinced expression of the author's other self. More-
over, his fastidious discontent, and the subtlety of mind which is the
greatest perhaps of his many charms, point him toward some un-
explored quarter, where, as he has not investigated it, he fancies the
truth may lie. The reader of Mallock goes to him for witty com-
ment, satire, suggestion; and to get into a certain high-bred society

9626 WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

where the scholar is at home and the gospel of good-breeding is
preached. But that reader will never know in what social system of
the past — in slavery, feudalism, or absolutism — Mallock's Utopia is
to be sought.

AN EVENING'S TABLE-TALK AT THE VILLA
From <The New Republic >

No PROPOSAL could have been happier than Lady Grace's, of
the garden banquet in the pavilion. It seemed to the
guests, when they were all assembled there, that the lovely
summer's day was going to close with a scene from fairy-land.
The table itself, with its flowers and glowing fruit, and its many-
colored Venetian glass, shone and gleamed and sparkled in the
evening light, that was turning outside to a cool mellow amber;
and above, from the roof, in which the dusk was already dark-
ness, hung china lamps in the shape of green and purple grape
clusters, looking like luminous fruit stolen from Aladdin's garden.
The pavilion, open on all sides, was supported on marble pillars
that were almost hidden in red and white roses. Behind, the eye
rested on great tree trunks and glades of rich foliage ; and before,
it would pass over turf and flowers, till it reached the sea be-
yond, on which in another hour the faint silver of the moonlight
would begin to tremble.

There was something in the whole scene that was at once
calming and exhilarating; and nearly all present seemed to feel
in some measure this double effect of it. Dr. Jenkinson had
been quite . restored by an afternoon's nap; and his face was now
all a-twinkle with a fresh benignity, — that had, however, like an
early spring morning, just a faint suspicion of frost in it. Mr.
Storks even was less severe than usual; and as he raised his
champagne to his lips, he would at times look very nearly con-
versational.

<( My dear Laurence, y> exclaimed Mr. Herbert, <( it really
almost seems as if your visions of the afternoon had come true,
and that we actually were in your New Republic already. I can
only say that if it is at all like this, it will be an entirely charm-
ing place — too charming, perhaps. But now remember this:
you have but half got through the business to which you first
addressed yourselves, — that of forming a picture of a perfect

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK 9627

aristocracy, an aristocracy in the true and genuine sense of the
word. You are all to have culture, or taste. Very good: you
have talked a great deal about that, and you have seen what you
mean by it; and you have recognized, above all, that it includes
a discrimination between right and wrong. But now you, with
all this taste and culture, — you gifted men and women of the
nineteenth century, — what sort of things does your taste teach
you to reach out towards ? In what actions and aims, in what
affections and emotions, would you place your happiness ? That
is what I want to hear, — the practical manifestations of this
culture. 9

<(Ah, w said Mr. Rose, <( I have at this moment a series of
essays in the press, which would go far towards answering these
questions of yours. They do indeed deal with just this: the
effect of the choicer culture of this century on the soul of man;
the ways in which it endows him with new perceptions; how it
has made him, in fact, a being altogether more highly organ-
ized. All I regret is that these choicer souls, these Xapievres, are
as yet like flowers that have not found a climate in which they
can thrive properly. That mental climate will doubtless come
with time. What we have been trying to do this afternoon is, I
imagine, nothing more than to anticipate it in imagination. })

"Well," said Mr. Herbert, with a little the tone of an Inquis-
itor, "that is just what I have been asking. What will this
climate be like, and what will these flowers be like in this cli-
mate ? How would your culture alter and better the present, if
its powers were equal to its wishes ? w

Mr. Rose's soft lulling tone harmonized well with the scene
and hour, and the whole party seemed willing to listen to him;
or at any rate, no one felt any prompting to interrupt him.

<( I can show you an example, Mr. Herbert, >} he said, <( of
culture demanding a finer climate, in — if you will excuse my
seeming egoism — in myself. For instance (to take the widest
matter i can fix upon, the general outward surroundings of our
lives), — often, when I walk about London, and see how hideous
its whole external aspect is, and what a dissonant population
throng it, a chill feeling of despair comes over me. Consider
how the human eye delights in form and color, and the ear in
tempered and harmonious sounds; and then think for a moment
of a London street! Think of the shapeless houses, the forest of
ghastly chimney-pots, of the hell of distracting noises made by

9628

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

the carts, the cabs, the carriages; think of the bustling-, common-
place, careworn crowds that jostle you; think of an omnibus,
think of a four-wheeler — )}

<( I often ride in an omnibus, w said Lord Allen, with a slight
smile, to Miss Merton.

<( It is true, >J replied Mr. Rose, only overhearing the tone in
which these words were said, (< that one may ever and again
catch some touch of sunlight that will for a moment make the
meanest object beautiful with its furtive alchemy. But that is
Nature's work, not man's; and we must never confound the
accidental beauty that Nature will bestow on man's work, even
at its worst, with the rational and designed beauty of man's
work at its best. It is this rational human beauty that I say
our modern city life is so completely wanting in; nay, the look
of out-of-door London seems literally to stifle the very power of
imagining such beauty possible. Indeed, as I wander along our
streets, pushing my way among the throngs of faces, — faces
puckered with misdirected thought or expressionless with none;
barbarous faces set towards Parliament,' or church, or scientific
lecture-rooms, or government offices, or counting-houses, — I say,
as I push my way amongst all the sights and sounds of the
streets of our great city, only one thing ever catches my eye
that breaks in upon my mood and warns me I need not de-
spair. M

(<And what is that ? " asked Allen with some curiosity.

(<The shops," Mr. Rose answered, <( of certain of our uphol-
sterers and dealers in works of art. Their windows, as I look
into them, act like a sudden charm on me; like a splash of cold
water dashed on my forehead when I am fainting. For I seem
there to have got a glimpse of the real heart of things ; and as
my eyes rest on the perfect pattern (many of which are really
quite delicious; indeed, when I go to ugly houses, I often take
a scrap of some artistic cretonne with me in my pocket as a
kind of aesthetic smelling-salts) , — I say, when I look in at their
windows, and my eyes rest on the perfect pattern of some new
fabric for a chair or for a window curtain, or on some new de-
sign for a wall paper, or on some old china vase, I become at
once sharply conscious, Mr. Herbert, that despite the ungenial
mental climate of the present age, strange yearnings for and
knowledge of true beauty are beginning to show themselves like
flowers above the weedy soil; and I remember, amidst the roar

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK 9629

and clatter of our streets, and the mad noises of our own times,
that there is amongst us a growing number who have deliber-
ately turned their backs on all these things, and have thrown
their whole souls and sympathies into the happier art ages of the
past. They have gone back," said Mr. Rose, raising his voice a
little, <(to Athens and to Italy; to the Italy of Leo and to the
Athens of Pericles. To such men the clamor, the interests, the
struggles of our own times become as meaningless as they really
are. To them the boyhood of Bathyllus is of more moment than
the manhood of Napoleon. Borgia is a more familiar name than
Bismarck. I know, indeed, — and I really do not blame them, —
several distinguished artists who, resolving to make their whole
lives consistently perfect, will on principle never admit a . news-
paper into their houses that is of later date than the times of
Addison: and I have good trust that the number of such men
is on the increase; men, I mean," said Mr. Rose, toying- tenderly
with an exquisite wine-glass of Salviati's, "who with a steady
and set purpose follow art for the sake of art, beauty for the
sake of beauty, love for the sake of love, life for the sake of
life."

Mr. Rose's slow gentle voice, which was apt at certain times
to become peculiarly irritating, sounded now like the- evening air
grown articulate; and had secured him hitherto a tranquil hear-
ing, as if by a kind of spell. This, however, seemed here in
sudden danger of snapping.

<( What, Mr. Rose ! " exclaimed Lady Ambrose, (< do you mean
to say, then, that the number of people is on the increase who
won't read the newspapers ? "

<(Why, the men must be absolute idiots !* said Lady Grace,
shaking her gray curls, and putting on her spectacles to look at
Mr. Rose.

Mr, Rose, however, was imperturbable.

<( Of course," he said, <(you may have newspapers if you will;
I myself always have them : though in general they are too full
of public events to be of much interest. I was merely speaking
just now of the spirit of the movement. And of that we must
all of us here have some knowledge. We must all of us have
friends whose houses more or less embody it. And even if we
had not, we could not help seeing signs of it — signs of how true
and earnest it is, in the enormous sums that are now given for
really good objects. J>

9630

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

"That," said Lady Grace, with some tartness, (<is true enough,
thank God!"

<(But I can't see," said Lady Ambrose, whose name often
figured in the Times, in the subscription lists of advertised chari-
ties,— <( I can't see, Mr. Rose, any reason in that why we should
not read the newspapers."

<(The other day, for instance," said Mr. Rose reflectively,
al heard of eight Chelsea shepherdesses picked up by a dealer,
I really forget where, — in some common cottage, if I recollect
aright, covered with dirt, giving no pleasure to any one, — and
these were all sold in a single day, and not one of them fetched
Jess than two hundred and twenty pounds."

(</ can't help thinking they must have come from Cremorne,"
said Mrs. Sinclair softly.

(< But why," said Mr. Rose, (< should I speak of particular
instances ? We must all of us have friends whose houses are
full of priceless treasures such as these; the whole atmosphere of
whose rooms really seems impregnated with art, — seems, in fact,
Mr. Herbert, such an atmosphere as we should dream of for our
New Republic. "

<( To be sure, " exclaimed Lady Ambrose, feeling that she
had at last got upon solid ground. <(By the way, Mr. Rose,"
she said with her most gracious of smiles, <( I suppose you have
hardly seen Lady Julia Hayman's new house in Belgrave Square ?
I'm sure that would delight you. I should like to take you there
some day and show it to you."

<(I have seen it," said Mr. Rose with languid condescension.
<( It was very pretty, I thought, — some of it really quite nice."

This, and the slight rudeness of manner it was said with,
raised Mr. Rose greatly in Lady Ambrose's estimation, and she
began to think with respect of his late utterances.

<(Well, Mr. Herbert," Mr. Rose went on, (<what I want to
say is this: We have here in the present age, as it is, fragments
of the right thing. We have a number of isolated right interiors;
we have a few, very few, right exteriors. But in our ideal State,
our entire city — our London, the metropolis of our society —
would be as a whole perfect as these fragments. Taste would
not there be merely an indoor thing. It would be written visi-
bly for all to look upon, in our streets, our squares, our gardens.
Could we only mold England to our wishes, the thing to do, I
am persuaded, would be to remove London to some kindlier site,

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9631

that it might there be altogether horn anew. I myself would
have it taken to the southwest, and to the sea-coast, where the
waves are blue, and where the air is calm and fine, and there — "

(< Ah me ! }> sighed Mr. Luke with a lofty sadness, (< coelum non
animam mutant.^

(< Pardon me," said Mr. Rose: <(few paradoxes — and most para-
doxes are false — are, I think, so false as that. This much at
least of sea-like man's mind has: that scarcely anything so dis-
tinctly gives a tone to it as the color of the skies he lives under.
And I was going to say, w he went on, looking out dreamily
towards the evening waves, "that as the imagination is a quick
workman, I can at this moment see our metropolis already trans-
planted and rebuilt. I seem to see it now as it were from a
distance, with its palaces, its museums, its churches, its convents,
its gardens, its picture galleries, — a cluster of domed and pillared
marble, sparkling on a gray headland. It is Rome, it is Athens,
it is Florence, arisen and come to life again, in these modern
days. The aloe-tree of beauty again blossoms there, under the
azure stainless sky."

<( Do you know, Mr. Rose, }> said Lady Ambrose in her most
cordial manner, (<all this is very beautiful; and certainly no one
can think London as it is more ugly than I do. That's natural
in me, isn't it, being a denizen of poor prosaic South Audley
Street as I am ? But don't you think that your notion is — •
it's very beautiful, I quite feel that — but don't you think it is
perhaps a little too dream -like — too unreal, if you know what I
mean ? })

* Such a city, * said Mr. Rose earnestly, (< is indeed a dream ;
but it is a dream which we might make a reality, would circum-
stances only permit of it. We have many amongst us who know
what is beautiful, and who passionately desire it; and would
others only be led by these, it is quite conceivable that we might
some day have a capital, the entire aspect of which should be
the visible embodiment of our finest and most varied culture, oui
most sensitive taste, and our deepest aesthetic measure of things.
This is what this capital of our New Republic must be, this
dwelling-place of our ideal society. We shall have houses, gal-
leries, streets, theatres, such as Giulio Romano or Giorgio Vasari
or Giulio Campi would have rejoiced to look at; we shall have
metal-work worthy of the hand of Ghiberti and the praise of
Michel Angelo; we shall rival Domenico Beccafumi with our
pavements. As you wander through our thoroughfares and our

9632 WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

gardens, your feelings will not be jarred by the presence of
human vulgarity, or the desolating noise of traffic; nor in every
spare space will your eyes be caught by abominable advertise-
ments of excursion trains to Brighton, or of Horniman's cheap
tea. They will rest instead, here on an exquisite fountain, here
on a statue, here on a bust of Zeus or Hermes or Aphrodite,
glimmering in a laureled nook; or on a Mater Dolor osa looking
down on you from her holy shrine; or on the carved marble
gate-posts of our palace gardens, or on their wrought-iron or
wrought-bronze gates; or perhaps on such triumphal arches as
that which Antonio San Gallo constructed in honor of Charles V.,
and of which you must all remember the description given by
Vasari. Such a city," said Mr. Rose, (( would be the externaliza-
tion of the human spirit in the highest state of development that
we can conceive for it. We should there see expressed openly
all our appreciations of all the beauty that we can detect in the
world's whole history. The wind of the spirit that breathed
there would blow to us from all the places of the past, and be
charged with infinite odors. Every frieze on our walls, every
clustered capital of a marble column, would be a garland or nose-
gay of associations. Indeed, our whole city, as compared with
the London that is now, would be itself a nosegay as compared
with a faggot; and as related to the life that I would see lived
in it, it would be like a shell murmuring with all the world's
memories, and held to the ear of the two twins Life and Love."

Mr. Rose had got so dreamy by this time that he felt him-
self the necessity of turning a little more matter-of-fact again.

(<You will see what I mean, plainly enough," he said, (<if you
will just think of our architecture, and consider how that natur-
ally will be— »

<( Yes, " said Mr. Luke, (< I should be glad to hear about our
architecture."

(< — how that naturally will be, " Mr. Rose went on, (<of no
style in particular. "

"The deuce it won't ! " exclaimed Mr. Luke.

"No," continued Mr. Rose unmoved; <(no style in particular,
but a renaissance of all styles. It will matter nothing to us
whether they be pagan or Catholic, classical or mediaeval. We
shall be quite without prejudice or bigotry. To the eye of true
taste, an Aquinas in his cell before a crucifix, or a Narcissus
gazing at himself in a still fountain, are — in their own ways,
you know — equally beautiful."

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9633

<( Well, really, w said Miss Merton, <( I can not fancy St. Thomas
being a very taking" object to people who don't believe in him
either as a saint or a philosopher. I always think that except
from a Christian point of view, a saint can be hardly better de-
scribed than by Newman's lines, as —

<A bundle of bones, whose breath
Infects the world before his death. >>>#

c< I remember the lines well, w said Mr. Rose calmly, <( and the
writer you mention puts them in the mouth of a yelping devil.
But devils, as far as I know, are not generally — except perhaps
Milton's — conspicuous for taste; indeed, if we may trust Goethe,
the very touch of a flower is torture to them."

(< Dante's biggest devil, )} cried Mr. Saunders, to every one's
amazement, (( chewed Judas Iscariot like a quid of tobacco, to all
eternity. He, at any rate, knew what he liked. }>

Mr. Rose started, and visited Mr. Saunders with a rapid
frown. He then proceeded, turning again to Miss Merton as if
nothing had happened.

<( Let me rather, }) he said, (< read a nice sonnet to you, which
I had sent to me this morning, and which was in my mind
just now. These lines" (Mr. Rose here produced a paper from
his pocket) <(were written by a boy of eighteen, — a youth of
extraordinary promise, I think, — whose education I may myself
claim to have had some share in directing. Listen, }> he said,
laying the verses before him on a clean plate.

<( Three visions in the watches of one night

Made sweet my sleep — almost too sweet to tell.

One was Narcissus by a woodside well,
And on the moss his limbs and feet were white;
And one, Queen Venus, blown for my delight

Across the blue sea in a rosy shell;

And one, a lean Aquinas in his cell,
Kneeling, his pen in hand, with aching sight
Strained towards a carven Christ: and of these three

I knew not which was fairest. First I turned
Towards that soft boy, who laughed and fled from me;
Towards Venus then, and she smiled once, and she

Fled also. Then with teeming heart I yearned,
O Angel of the Schools, towards Christ with theeP

• Vide J. H. Newman's < Dream of Gerontius.>

9634

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

(< Yes, " murmured Mr. Rose to himself, folding up the paper,
<(they are dear lines. Now there," he said, (<we have a true and
tender expression of the really catholic spirit of modern aestheti-
cism, which holds nothing common or unclean. It is in this
spirit, I say, that the architects of our State will set to work.
And thus for our houses,, for our picture galleries, for our
churches, — I trust we shall have many churches, — they will
select and combine — "

<(Do you seriously mean," broke in Allen a little impatiently,
"that it is a thing to wish for and to look forward to, that we
should abandon all attempts at original architecture, and content
ourselves with simply sponging on the past ? "

<( I do, " replied Mr. Rose suavely ; (( and for this reason, if
for no other, — that the world can now successfully do nothing
else. Nor indeed is it to be expected, or even wished, that it
should. »

(< You say we have no good architecture now ! " exclaimed
Lady Ambrose; <(but, Mr. Rose, have you forgotten our modern
churches ? Don't you think them beautiful ? Perhaps you never
go to All Saints' ? "

<(I every now and then," said Mr. Rose, <(when I am in the
weary mood for it, attend the services of our English Ritualists,
and I admire their churches very much indeed. In some places
the whole thing is really managed with surprising skill. The
dim religious twilight, fragrant with the smoke of incense; the
tangled roofs that the music seems to cling to; the tapers, the
high altar, and the strange intonation of the priests, — all produce
a curious old-world effect, and seem to unite one with things that
have been long dead. Indeed, it all seems to me far more a
part of the past than the services of the Catholics,"

Lady Ambrose did not express her approbation of the last
part of this sentiment, out of regard for Miss Merton; but she
gave a smile and a nod of pleased intelligence to Mr. Rose.

"Yes," Mr. Rose went on, "there is a regretful insincerity
about it all, that is very nice, and that at once appeals to me,
'Gleich einer alten halbverklungnen Sage.'* The priests are
only half in earnest; the congregations even — "

"Then I am quite sure," interrupted Lady Ambrose with
vigor, <(that you can never have heard Mr. Cope preach."

*«Like some old half -forgotten legend. »

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9635

<( I don't know," said Mr. Rose languidly. c< I never inquired,
nor have I ever heard any one so much as mention, the names
of any of them. Now all that, Lady Ambrose, were life really
in the state it should be, you would be able to keep.>J

<( Do you seriously, and in sober earnest, mean, w Allen again
broke in, <(that you think it a good thing that all our art and
architecture should be borrowed and insincere, and that our very
religion should be nothing but a dilettante memory ? >J

<(The opinion, }) said Mr. Rose, — "which by the way you
slightly misrepresent, — is not mine only, but that of all those
of our own day who are really devoting themselves to art for
its own sake. I will try to explain the reason of this. In the
world's life, just as in the life of a man, there are certain peri-
ods of eager and all-absorbing action, and these are followed by
periods of memory and reflection. We then look back upon
our past and become for the first time conscious of what we
are, and of what we have done. We then see the dignity of
toil, and the grand results of it; the beauty and the strength
of faith, and the fervent power of patriotism: which whilst we
labored, and believed, and loved, we were quite blind to. Upon
such a reflective period has the world now entered. It has acted
and believed already: its task now is to learn to value action
and belief, to feel and to be thrilled at the beauty of them. And
the chief means by which it can learn this is art; the art of a
renaissance. For by the power of such art, all that was beauti-
ful, strong, heroic, or tender in the past, — all the actions, pas-
sions, faiths, aspirations of the world, that lie so many fathom
deep in the years, — float upward to the tranquil surface of the
present, and make our lives like what seems to me one of the
loveliest things in nature, the iridescent film on the face of a
stagnant water. Yes; the past is not dead unless we choose that
it shall be so. Christianity itself is not dead. There is ( nothing
of it that doth fade,' but turns (into something rich and strange,*
for us to give a new tone to our lives with. And believe me, }>
Mr. Rose went on, gathering earnestness, <(that the happiness
possible in such conscious periods is the only true happiness.
Indeed, the active periods of the world were not really happy at
all. We only fancy them to. have been so by a pathetic fallacy.
Is the hero happy during his heroism ? No, but after it, when
he sees what his heroism was, and reads the glory of it in the
eyes of youth or maiden. ®

9636

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

<(A11 this is very poor stuff — very poor stuff, " murmured Dr.
Jenkinson, whose face had become gradually the very picture of
crossness.

(< Do you mean, Mr. Rose, " said Miss Merton, with a half
humorous, half incredulous smile, <(that we never value religion
till we have come to think it nonsense ? "

(< Not nonsense — no, " exclaimed Mr. Rose in gentle horror;
w I only mean that it never lights our lives so beautifully as
when it is leaving them like the evening sun. It is in such
periods of the world's life that art springs into being in its
greatest splendor. Your Raphael, Miss Merton, who painted you
your (dear Madonnas,' was a luminous cloud in the sunset sky
of the Renaissance, — a cloud that took its fire from a faith that
was sunk or sinking. "

(< I'm afraid that the faith is not quite sunk yet," said Miss
Merton, with a slight sudden flush in her cheeks, and with just
the faintest touch of suppressed anger.

Mr. Saunders, Mr. Stockton, Mr. Storks, and Mr. Luke all
raised their eyebrows.

"No," said Mr. Rose, "such cyclic sunsets are happily apt to
linger. »

<( Mr. Rose," exclaimed Lady Ambrose, with her most gracious
of smiles, (( of course every one who has ears must know that all
this is very beautiful; but I am positively so stupid that I haven't
been quite able to follow it all."

<( I will try to make my meaning clearer," he said, in a
brisker tone. (< I often figure to myself an unconscious period
and a conscious one, . as two women : one an untamed creature
with embrowned limbs, native to the air and the sea; the other
marble-white and swan-soft, couched delicately on cushions be-
fore a mirror, and watching her own supple reflection gleaming
in the depths of it. On the one is the sunshine and the sea
spray. The wind of heaven and her • unbound hair are play-
mates. The light of the sky is in her eyes; on her lips is a free
laughter. We look at her, and we know that she is happy.
We know it, mark me; but she knows it not. Turn, however,
to the other, and all is changed. • Outwardly, there is no gladness
there. Her dark, gleaming eyes open depth within depth upon
us, like the circles of a new Inferno, There is a clear, shadowy
pallor on her cheek. Only her lips are scarlet. There is a sad-
ness, a languor, — even in the grave tendrils of her heavy hair,

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9637

and % in each changing curve of her bosom as she breathes or
sighs. J>

<(< What a very odd man Mr. Rose is ! }> said Lady Ambrose in
a loud whisper. <( He always seems to talk of everybody as if
they had no clothes on. And does he mean by this that we
ought to be always in the dumps ? >J

"Yes," Mr. Rose was meanwhile proceeding, his voice again
growing visionary, (< there is no eagerness, no action there : and
yet all eagerness, all action is known to her as the writing on
an open scroll; only, as she reads, even in the reading of it,
action turns into emotion and eagerness into a sighing memory.
Yet such a woman really may stand symbolically for us as the
patroness and the lady of all gladness, who makes us glad in
the only way now left us. And not only in the only way, but in
the best way — the way of ways. Her secret is self -consciousness.
She knows that she is fair; she knows, too, that she is sad: but
she sees that sadness is lovely, and so sadness turns to joy. Such
a woman may be taken as a symbol, not of our architecture only,
but of all the aesthetic surroundings with which we shall shelter
and express our life. Such a woman do I see whenever I enter
a ritualistic church — }>

<( I know, " said Mrs. Sinclair, <( that very peculiar people do go
to such places; but, Mr. Rose,}> she said with a look of appealing
inquiry, <( I thought they were generally rather overdressed than
otherwise ? w

"The im agination, ® said Mr. Rose, opening his eyes in grave
wonder at Mrs. Sinclair, (< may give her what garb it chooses.
Our whole city, then — the city of our New Republic — will be in
keeping with this spirit. It will be the architectural and decorat-
ive embodiment of the most educated longings of our own times
after order and loveliness and delight, whether of the senses or
the imagination. It will be, as it were, a resurrection of the
past, in response to the longing and the passionate regret of
the present. It will be such a resurrection as took place in Italy
during its greatest epoch, only with this difference — w

(< You seem to have forgotten trade and business altogether, w
said Dr. Jenkinson. (< I think, however rich you intend to be,
you will find that they are necessary. w

<(Yes, Mr. Rose, you're not going to deprive us of all our
shops, I hope ? » said Lady Ambrose.

9638

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

"Because, you know," said Mrs. Sinclair with a soft mali-
ciousness, (< we can't go without dresses altogether, Mr. Rose.
And if I were there,® she continued plaintively, <( I should want
a bookseller to publish the scraps of verse — poetry, as I am
pleased to call it — that I am always writing. ®

<( Pooh ! ® said Mr. Rose, a little annoyed, (< we shall have all
that somewhere, of course; but it will be out of the way, in a
sort of Piraeus, where the necessary xdxyhn — ®

WA sort of what ? ® said Lady Ambrose.

<( Mr. Rose merely means, ® said Donald Gordon, <( that there
must be good folding-doors between the offices and the house of
life, and that the servants are not to be seen walking about in
the pleasure-grounds. ®

"Yes,* said Mr. Rose, (< exactly so.®

<(Well, then,® said Lady Ambrose, (< I quite agree with you,
Mr. Rose; and if wishing were only having, I've not the least
doubt that we should all of us be going back to Mr. Rose's
city to-morrow, instead of to London, with its carts, and cabs,
and smoke, and all its thousand-and-one drawbacks. I'm sure,"
she said, turning to Miss Merton, <(you would, my dear, with all
your taste.®

(( It certainly, ® said Miss Merton smiling, (< all sounds very
beautiful. All that I am afraid of is, that we should not be
quite worthy of it.®

(<Nay,® said Mr. Rose, (<but the very point is that we shall
be worthy of it, and that it will be worthy of us. I said, if you
recollect, just now, that the world's ideal of the future must
resemble in many ways its memory of the Italian Renaissance.
But don't let that mislead you. It may resemble that, but it
will be something far in advance of it. During the last three
hundred years — in fact, during the last sixty or seventy years —
the soul of man has developed strangely in its sentiments and its
powers of feeling; in its powers, in fact, of enjoying life. As I
said, I have a work in the press devoted entirely to a description
of this growth. I have some of the proof-sheets with me; and
if you will let me, I should like to read you one or two pas-
sages. ®

<( I don't think much can be made out of that,® said Dr. Jen-
kinson, with a vindictive sweetness. (< Human sentiment dresses
itself in different fashions, as human ladies do; but I think

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9639

beneath the surface it is much the same. I mean,* he added,
suddenly recollecting" that he might thois seem to be rooting up
the wheat of his own opinions along with the tares of Mr.
Rose's, (< I mean that I don't think in seventy years, or even in
three hundred, you will be able to show that human nature has
very much changed. I don't think so."

Unfortunately, however, the Doctor found that instead of put-
ting down Mr. Rose by this, he had only raised up Mr. Luke.

<(Ah, Jenkinson, I think you are wrong there," said Mr. Luke.
<(As long as we recognize that this growth is at present confined
to a very small minority, the fact of such growth is the most
important, the most significant of all facts. Indeed, our friend
Mr. Rose is quite right thus far, in the stress he lays on our
appreciation of the past: that we have certainly in these modern
times acquired a new sense, by which alone the past can be
appreciated truly, — the sense which, if I may invent a phrase
for it, I should call that of Historical Perspective; so that now
really for the first time the landscape of history is beginning to
have some intelligible charm for us. And this, you know, is not
alL Our whole views of things (you, Jenkinson, must know this
as well as I do) — the Zeitgeist breathes upon them, and they do
not die; but they are changed, they are enlightened."

The Doctor was too much annoyed to make any audible
answer to this; but he murmured with some emphasis to him-
self, (< That's not what Mr. Rose was saying ; that's not what I
was contradicting."

<( You take, Luke, a rather more rose-colored view of things
than you did last night," said Mr. Storks.

"No," said Mr. Luke with a sigh, (<far from it. I am not
denying (pray, Jenkinson, remember this) that the majority of
us are at present either Barbarians or Philistines; and the ugli-
ness of these is more glaring now than at any former time. But
that any of us are able to see them thus distinctly in their true
colors itself shows that there must be a deal of light somewhere.
Even to make darkness visible some light is needed. We should
always recollect that. We are only discontented with ourselves
when we are struggling to be better than ourselves."

(< And in many ways, " said Laurence, <( I think the strug-
gle has been successful. Take for instance the pleasure we get
now from the aspects of external nature, and the way in which
these seem to mix themselves with our lives. This certainly is

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK ;

something distinctly modern. And nearly all our other feel-
ings, it seems to me, have changed just like this one, and have
become more sensitive and more highly organized. If we mayv
judge by its expression in literature, love has, certainly; and that,
I suppose, is the most important and comprehensive feeling in
life.*

<( Does Mr. Laurence only suppose that ? " sighed Mrs. Sinclair,
casting down her eyes.

"Well," said Dr. Jenkinson, <(our feelings about these two
things — about love and external nature — perhaps have changed
somewhat. Yes, I think they have. I think you might make an
interesting magazine article out of that — but hardly more."

<( I rather," said Laurence apologetically, <( agree with Mr.
Luke and Mr. Rose, that all our feelings have developed just as
these two have. And I think this is partly owing to the fusion
in our minds of our sacred and secular ideas; which indeed
you were speaking of this morning in your sermon. Thus, to
find some rational purpose in life was once merely enjoined as a
supernatural duty. In our times it has taken our common nature
upon it, and become a natural longing — though I fear," he added
softly, <(a fruitless one."

<( Yes, " suddenly exclaimed Lady Grac -i, who had been listen-
ing intently to her nephew's words; <(and if you are speaking of
modern progress, Otho, you should not leave out the diffusion of
those grand ideas of justice and right and freedom and humanity
which are at work in the great heart of the nation. We are
growing cultivated in Mr. Luke's noble sense of the word; and
our whole hearts revolt against the way in which women have
hitherto been treated, and against the cruelties which dogma
asserts the good God can practice, and the cruelties on the
poor animals which wicked men do practice. And war too,"
Lady Grace went on, a glow mounting into her soft faded
cheek: "think how fast we are outgrowing that! England at
any rate will never watch the outbreak of another war, with all
its inevitable cruelties, without giving at least one sob that shall
make all Europe pause and listen. Indeed, we must not forget
how the entire substance of religion is ceasing to be a mass of
dogmas, and is becoming embodied instead in practice and in
action. }>

<( Quite true. Lady Grace," said Mr. Luke. Lady Grace was
just about to have given a sign for rising; but Mr. Luke's assent

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

9641

detained her. (<As to war," he went on, "there may of course
be different opinions, — questions of policy may arise : w ((< As if
any policy," murmured Lady Grace, <( could justify us in such a
thing ! ") ((but religion — yes, that, as I have been trying" to teach
the world, is the great and important point on which culture is
beginning to cast its light; and with just the effect which you
describe. It is true that culture is at present but a little leaven
hid in a barrel of meal: but still it is doing its work slowly; and
in the matter of religion, — indeed, in all matters, for religion
rightly understood embraces all, — " (<( I do like to hear Mr. Luke
talk sometimes," murmured Lady Grace,) (<its effect is just this:
to show us that religion in any civilized, any reasonable, any
sweet sense, can never be found except embodied in action; that
it is in fact nothing but right action, pointed — winged, as it
were — by right emotion, by a glow, an aspiration, an aspiration
toward God — " (Lady Grace sighed with feeling) (<not, of course, "
Mr. Luke went on confidentially, "that petulant Pedant of the
theologians, that irritable angry Father with the very uncertain
temper, but toward — "

(<An infinite, inscrutable, loving Being," began Lady Grace,
with a slight moisture in her eyes.

(< Quite so," said Mr. Luke, not waiting to listen: <( towards
that great Law, that great verifiable tendency of things, that
great stream whose flowing1 such of us as are able are now so
anxiously trying to accelerate. There is no vain speculation
about creation and first causes and consciousness here; which are
matters we can never verify, and which matter nothing to us."

<( But, " stammered Lady Grace aghast, <( Mr. Luke, do you
mean to say that ? But it surely must matter something whether
God can hear our prayers, and will help us, and whether we owe
him any duty, and whether he is conscious of what we do, and
will judge us: it must matter. "

Mr. Luke leaned forward towards Lady Grace and spoke to
her in a confidential whisper.

(<Not two straws — not that," he said, with a smile, and a very
slight fillip of his finger and thumb.

Lady Grace was thunderstruck.

(< But, " again she stammered softly and eagerly, <( unless you
say there is no personal — "

Mr. Luke hated the word personal: it was so much mixed
up in his mind with theology, that he even winced if he had to
speak of personal talk.

9642

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

<( My dear Lady Grace, " he said in a tone of surprised remon-
strance, <(you are talking like a bishop."

<(Well, certainly," said Lady Grace, rising, and struggling she
hardly knew how into a smile, <( nolo episcopari. You see I do
know a little Latin, Mr. Luke."

"Yes," said Mr. Luke with a bow, as he pushed back a chair
for her, (<and a bit that has more wisdom in it than all other
ecclesiastical Latin put together."

((We're going to leave you gentlemen to smoke your cigar-
ettes, " said Lady Grace. <(We think of going down on the beach
for a little, and looking at the sea, which is getting silvery; and
by-and-by, I daresay you will not expel us if we come back for
a little tea and coffee."

«Damn it!"

Scarcely had the last trailing skirt swept glimmering out of
the pavilion into the mellow slowly brightening moonlight, than
the gentlemen were astounded by this sudden and terrible excla-
mation. It was soon found to have issued from Mr. Saunders,
who had hardly spoken more than a few sentences during the
whole of dinner.

<( What can be the matter ? " was inquired by several voices.

(< My fool of a servant, " said Mr. Saunders sullenly, <( has, I
find, in packing, wrapped up a small sponge of mine in my dis-
proof of God's existence."

(<H'f," shuddered Mr. Rose, shrinking from Mr. Saunders's
somewhat piercing tones, and resting his forehead on his hand;
<(my head aches sadly. I think I will go down to the sea, and
join the ladies."

<(I," said Mr. Saunders, (<if you will excuse me, must go and
see in what state the document is, as I left it drying, hung on
the handle of my jug. "

No sooner had Mr. Saunders and Mr. Rose departed than
Dr. Jenkinson began to recover his equanimity somewhat. Seeing
this, Mr. Storks, who had himself during dinner been first soothed
and then ruffled into silence, found suddenly the strings of his
tongue loosed.

(< Now, those are the sort of young fellows," he said, look-
ing after the retreating form of Mr. Saunders, (<that really do a
good deal to bring all solid knowledge into contempt in the minds
of the half -educated. There's a certain hall in London, not far
from the top of Regent Street, where I'm told he gives Sunday
lectures. "

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK 9643

"Yes," said Dr. Jenkinson, -sipping his claret, "it's all very
bad taste — very bad taste. »

«And the worst of it is," said Mr. Storks, "that these young
men really get hold of a fact or two, and then push them on to
their own coarse and insane conclusions, — which have, I admit,
to the vulgar eye, the look of being obvious. "

"Yes/ said Dr. Jenkinson with a seraphic sweetness, "we
should always suspect everything that seems very obvious. Glar-
ing inconsistencies and glaring consistencies are both sure to van-
ish if you look closely into them."

"Now, all that about God, for instance," Mr. Storks went on,
(< is utterly uncalled for ; and as young Saunders puts it, is utterly
misleading."

<(Yes," said Dr. Jenkinson, <( it all depends upon the way you
say it."

<( I hardly think, " said Mr. Stockton with a sublime weariness,
"that we need waste much thought upon his way. It is a very
common one, — that of the puppy that barks at the heels of the
master whose meat it steals."

"May I," said Mr. Herbert gently, after a moment's pause,
"ask this — for I am a little puzzled here: Do I understand
that Mr. Saunders's arguments may be held, on the face of the
thing, to disprove the existence of God ? "

Mr. Storks and Mr. Stockton both stared gravely on Mr.
Herbert, and said nothing. Dr. Jenkinson stared at him too;
but the Doctor's eye lit up into a little sharp twinkle of benign
content and amusement, and he said: —

" No, Mr. Herbert, I don't think Mr. Saunders can disprove
that, nor any one else either. For the world has at present no
adequate definition of God; and I think we should be able to
define a thing before we can satisfactorily disprove it. I think
so. I have no doubt Mr. Saunders can disprove the existence of
God as he would define him. All atheists can do that."

"Ah," murmured Mr. Stockton, "nobly said!"

"But that's not the way," the Doctor went on, "to set to
work, — this kind of rude denial. We must be loyal to nature.
We must do nothing per saltum. We must be patient. We
mustn't leap at Utopias, either religious or irreligious. Let us
be content with the knowledge that all dogmas will expand in
proportion as we feel they need expansion; for all mere forms
are transitory, and even the personality of — "

9644

WILLIAM HURRELL MALLOCK

Fatal word! It was like a match to a cannon.

<(Ah, Jenkinson," exclaimed Mr. Luke, and Dr. Jenkinson
stopped instantly, <( we see what you mean ; and capital sense it
is too. But you do yourself as much as any one else a great
injustice, in not seeing that the age is composed of two parts,
and that the cultured minority is infinitely in advance of the Phi-
listine majority — which alone is, properly speaking, the present;
the minority being really the soul of the future waiting for its
body, which at present can exist only as a Utopia. It is the
wants of this soul that we have been talking over this afternoon.
When the ladies come back to us, there are several things that
I should like to say; and then you will see what we mean, Jen-
kinson, and that even poor Rose has really some right on his
side. )}

At the mention of Mr. Rose's name the Doctor's face again
curdled into frost.

<( I don't think so." That was all he said.

9^45

SIR THOMAS MALORY

AND THE <MORTE D' ARTHUR'

(FIFTEENTH CENTURY)
BY ERNEST RHYS

IHE one certain thing about Sir Thomas Malory is, that he
wrote the first and finest romance of chivalry in our com-
mon tongue, — the (Morte d' Arthur.' Beyond this, and the
testimony that the book affords as to its author, we have little
record of him. That he was a Welshman, however, seems highly
probable; and his name is certainly of Welsh origin, derived as it is
from Maelor. That he was a clerk in holy orders is likely too. It
was usual to distinguish vicars at that period and later by the prefix
(< Sir }) ; and various clergymen of the same Christian name and sur-
name as his may be traced by old tombs, at Mobberley in Cheshire
and elsewhere. Bale, in his interesting Latin chronicle of 1548, on
( Illustrious Writers of Great Britain,* speaks of his <cmany cares of
State, }) it is true; but church and State were then closely enough al-
lied to make the two things compatible with our view of him. Bale's
further account is brief but eloquent. Our romancer was a man, he
tells us, <(of heroic spirit, who shone from his youth in signal gifts of
mind and body.** Moreover, a true scholar, a true man of letters, who
never interrupted his quest <( through all the remnants of the world's
scattered antiquity. }) So it was that Malory was led to gather, from
various sources, all the traditions he could find <( concerning the valor
and the victories of the most renowned King Arthur of the Britons. w
Out of many materials, in French and Latin, in Welsh and Breton, he
shaped the book <Morte d' Arthur > as we now know it; working
with a sense of style, and with a feeling for the tale-teller's and the
romancer's art, which show him to be much more than the mere
compiler and book-maker that some critics have been content to call
him.

A word now as to the dates of Malory's writing, and Caxton's
publishing, the < Morte d' Arthur, } and we turn from the history of the
book to the book itself. In his last page, — after asking his readers
to pray for him, — Malory says in characteristic words, which again
may be thought to point to his being more than a mere layman:
<( This book was finished the ninth year of the reign of King Edward

9646

SIR THOMAS MALORY

the Fourth, ... as Jesu help me, for his great might; as he
[/. e., Malory] is the servant of Jesu both day and night. » The period
thus fixed brings us approximately to the year 1469, and to the ten
years previous as the probable time when the ( Morte d'Arthur J was
being written. Caxton published it in 1485, and then referred to
Malory as still living. Hence he and his noble romance both fall
well within that wonderful fifteenth century which saw the rise of
English poetry, with Chaucer as its morning star,—

« — the morning star of song, who made
His music heard below, — )J

and the revival of Greek learning. It is significant enough, seeing
their close kinship, that romance with Malory, and poetry with Chau-
cer, should have come into English literature in the same period.

As for Malory and his romance, there is hardly a more difficult
and a more delightful undertaking in all the history of literature
than that of the quest of its first beginnings. Principal Rhys has
in his erudite studies in the Arthurian Legend carried us far back
into the early Celtic twilight, — the twilight of the morning of man
and his spiritual awakening, — and shown us some of the curious par-
allels between certain Aryan myths and the heroic folk-tales which
lent their color to the "culture-hero," Arthur.

To examine these with the critical attention they require is be-
yond the scope of the present brief essay; but we may gather from
their threads a very interesting clue to the <( coming of Ring Arthur, w
in another sense than that of the episode so finely described by Ten-
nyson. We see the mythical hero carried in vague folk-tales of the
primitive Celts, in their journey westward across Europe, when the
traditions were attached to some other name. Then we find these
folk-tales given a local habitation and a name in early Britain; until
at last the appearance of a worthy historical hero, a King Arthur of
the sixth century, provided a pivot on which the wheel of tradition
could turn with new effect. The pivot itself might be small and in-
significant enough, but the rim of the wheel might have layer after
layer of legend, and accretion after accretion of mythical matter,
added to it, till at last the pivot might well threaten to give way
under the strain. Not to work the metaphor too hard, the wheel
may be said to go to pieces at last, when the turn of the romancers,
as distinct from the folk-tale tellers, comes. The Welsh romancers
had their turn first; then their originals were turned into Latin
by quasi-historians like Geoffrey of Monmouth; carried into France,
given all manner of new chivalric additions and adornments, out of
the growing European stock, by writers like Robert de Borron; and
finally, at the right moment, recaptured by our later Welsh romancer,

SIR THOMAS MALORY 9647

Malory, working in the interest of a new language and a new litera-
ture, destined to play so extraordinary a part in both the New World
and the Old.

The art of fiction and romance displayed by Malory in making
this transfer of his French materials, is best to be gauged by com-
paring his (Morte d'Arthur) with such romances as those in the
famous Merlin cycle of De Borron and his school. To all students of
the subject, this comparative investigation will be found full of the
most curiously interesting results. Besides Malory, we have English
fourteenth-century versions of these French romances ; notably ( The
Romance of 'Merlin,* of which we owe to the Early English Text
Society an excellent reprint. To give some idea of the effect of this
translation, let us cite a sentence or two from its account of Merlin's
imprisonment in the Forest of Broceliande; which may be compared
with the briefer account in the (Morte d' Arthur.* Sir Gawain hears
the voice of Merlin, speaking as it were <(from a smoke or mist in
the air," and saying: —

((From hence may I not come out, — for in all the world is not so strong a
close as is this whereas I am: and it is neither of iron, nor steel, nor timber,
nor of stone; but it is of the air without any other thing, [bound] by enchant-
ment so strong that it may never be undone while the world endureth."

This is not unlike Malory; but a little further study of the two
side by side will show the reader curious in such things how much
he has improved upon these earlier legendary romances, by his pro-
cess of selection and concentration, and by his choice of persons and
episodes. On the other hand, we must concede to his critics that
some of his most striking passages, full of gallant adventure gallantly
described, are borrowed very closely. But then the great poets and
romancers have so often been great borrowers. Shakespeare borrowed
boldly and well; so did Herrick; so did Pope; so did Burns. And
why not Malory ?

It is sufficient if we remember that romance, like other branches
of literature, is not a sudden and original growth, but a graft from
an old famous stock. To set this graft skillfully in a new tree needed
no 'prentice hand; in doing it, Malory proved himself beyond question
a master of romance. His true praise is best to be summed up in
the long-continuing tribute paid to the ( Morte d'Arthur ) by other
poets and writers, artists and musicians. Milton, let us remember
hesitated whether he should not choose its subject for his magnum
opus, in the place of ( Paradise Lost.* Tennyson elected to give it
an idyllic presentment in the purple pages of his ( Idylls of the King.*
Still later poets — Matthew Arnold, William Morris, and Swinburne —
have gone to the same fountain-head; and in painting, the pictures

9648 SIR THOMAS MALORY

of Rossetti, Watts, and Sir Edward Burne-Jones bear a like tribute;
while in music, there is more than a reflection of the same influence
in the works of Wagner.

In all this, one may trace the vitality of the early Aryan folk-tale
out of which the Arthurian legend originally took its rise. Sun-
hero or "culture-hero," Celtic chieftain or British king, it is still the
radiant figure of King Arthur that emerges from the gray past, in
which myth is dimly merged into mediaeval romance. In Malory's
pages, to repeat, the historical King Arthur goes for little ; but (< the
ideal Arthur lives and reigns securely in that kingdom of old romance
of which Camelot is the capital, }) — his beautiful and fatal Guinevere
at his side, and Sir Galahad, Sir Launcelot, and his Knights of the
Round .Table gathered about him. And if there be, as Tennyson
made clear in his * Idylls, y a moral to this noble old romance, we»
may best seek it in the spirit of these words in Caxton's prologue,
which make the best and simplest induction to the book: —

« Herein may be seen noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness,
hardiness, love, friendship, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue, and sin. Do
after the good and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and
renown. And for to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to read in; but
for to give faith and belief that all is true that is contained herein, ye be at
your liberty.*

THE FINDING OF THE SWORD EXCALIBUR

From <Morte d' Arthur >

AND so Merlin and he departed, and as they rode King Arthur
said, <(I have no sword. » (< No matter, » said Merlin; « here-
by is a sword that shall be yours and I may." So they
rode till they came to a lake, which was a fair water and a
broad; and in the midst of the lake King- Arthur was aware of
an arm clothed in white samite, that held a fair sword in the
hand. "Lo," said Merlin unto the King, <( yonder is the sword
that I spake of."

With that they saw a damsel going upon the lake. <(What
damsel is that ?}) said the King. « That is the Lady of the Lake,»

SIR THOMAS MALORY

9649

said Merlin; (< and within that lake is a reach, and therein is as
fair a place as any is on earth, and richly beseen; and this dam-
sel will come to you anon, and then speak fair to her that she
will give you that sword." Therewith came the damsel to King
Arthur and saluted him, and he her again. (< Damsel, " said the
King, <(what sword is that which the arm holdeth yonder above
the water? I would it were mine, for I have no sword." « Sir
King, " said the damsel of the lake, <( that sword is mine, and if
ye will give me a gift when I ask it you, ye shall have it." <( By
my faith, " said King Arthur, (< I will give you any gift that you
will ask or desire." (< Well," said the damsel, <( go ye into yon-
der barge, and row yourself unto the sword, and take it and the
scabbard with you; and I will ask my gift when I see my time.*'

So King Arthur and Merlin alighted, tied their horses to two
trees, and so they went into the barge. And when they came
to the sword that the hand held, King Arthur took it up by
the handles, and took it with him; and the arm and the hand
went under the water, and so came to the land and rode forth.

Then King Arthur saw a rich pavilion. (< What signifieth
yonder pavilion ? " <( That is the knight's pavilion that ye fought
with last — Sir Pellinore; but he is out; for he is not there:
he hath had to do with a knight of yours, that hight Eglame,
and they have foughten together a great while, but at the last
Eglame fled, and else he had been dead; and Sir Pellinore hath
chased him to Carlion, and we shall anon meet with him in the
highway." (< It is well said," quoth King Arthur; <(now have I
a sword, and now will I wage battle with him and be avenged
on him." (< Sir, ye shall not do so," said Merlin: (< for the knight
is weary of fighting and chasing; so that ye shall have no wor-
ship to have a do with him. Also he will not lightly be matched
of one knight living: and therefore my counsel is, that ye let
him pass; for he shall do you good service in short time, and his
sons after his days. Also ye shall see that day in short space,
that ye shall be right glad to give him your sister to wife."
« When I see him, " said King Arthur, « I will do as ye advise
me."

Then King Arthur looked upon the sword and liked it passing
well. (< Whether liketh you better," said Merlin, « the sword or
the scabbard?" (< Me liketh better the sword," said King Arthur.
(< Ye are more unwise," said Merlin; (<for the scabbard is worth
ten of the sword: for while ye have the scabbard upon you, ye

9650

SIR THOMAS MALORY

shall lose no blood, be ye never so sore wounded, — therefore
keep well the scabbard alway with you." So they rode on to
Carlion.

THE WHITE HART AT THE WEDDING OF KING ARTHUR AND

QUEEN GUENEVER

From <Morte d' Arthur > 9

THEN was the high feast made ready, and the King- was wed-
ded at Camelot unto Dame Guenever, in the Church of St.
Stevens, with great solemnity; and as every man was set
after his degree, Merlin went unto all the Knights of the Round
Table, and bid them sit still, and that none should remove, <(for
ye shall see a marvelous adventure." Right so as they sat, there
came running in a white hart into the hall, and a white brachet
next him, and thirty couple of black running hounds came after
with a great cry, and the hart went about the Table Round. As
he went by the other tables, the white brachet caught him by
the flank, and pulled out a piece, wherethrough the hart leapt a
great leap, and overthrew a knight that sat at the table's side;
and therewith the knight arose and took up the brachet, and so
went forth out of the hall, and took his horse and rode his way
with the brachet.

Right soon anon came in a lady on a white palfrey, and cried
aloud to King Arthur, <( Sir, suffer me not to have this despite,
for the brachet was mine that the knight led away. " (< I may
not do therewith," said the King. With this there came a knight
riding all armed on a great horse, and took the lady with him
by force; and she cried and made great moan. When she was
gone the King was glad, because she made such a noise. "Nay,"
said Merlin, <( ye may not leave these adventures so lightly, for
these adventures must be brought again, or else it would be
disworship to you, and to your feast." (< I will," said the King,
"that all be done by your advice." "Then," said Merlin, «let
call Sir Gawaine, for he must bring again the white hart; also,
sir, ye must let call Sir Tor, for he must bring again the brachet
and the knight, or else slay him; also, let call King Pellinore, for
he must bring again the lady and the knight, ©r else slay him:
and these three knights shall do marvelous adventures or they
come again."

SIR THOMAS MALORY 965 T

THE MAID OF ASTOLAT

From <Morte d'Arthur>

Now speak we of the fair maid of Astolat, which made such
sorrow day and night, that she never slept, eat, nor drank;
and always she made her complaint unto Sir Launcelot.
So when she had thus endured about ten days, that she felt
that she must needs pass out of this world. Then she shrove
her clean and received her Creator; and ever she complained still
upon Sir Launcelot. Then hej ghostly father bade her leave such
thoughts. Then said she, <( Why should I leave such thoughts ?
am I not an earthly woman ? and all the while the breath is in
my body I may complain. For my belief is that I do none
offense, though I love an earthly man; and I take God unto
record, I never loved any but Sir Launcelot du Lake, nor never
shall; and a maiden I am, for him and for all other. And sith
it is the sufferance of God that I shall die for the love of so
noble a knight, I beseech the high Father of heaven for to have
mercy upon my soul; and that mine innumerable pains which
I suffer may be allegiance of part of my sins. For our sweet
Savior Jesu Christ, }> said the maiden, (( I take thee to record, I
was never greater offender against thy laws, but that I loved this
noble knight, Sir Launcelot, out of all measure; and of myself,
good Lord! I might not withstand the fervent love, wherefore I
have my death. }) And then she called her father, Sir Bernard,
and her brother, Sir Tirre; and heartily she prayed her father
that her brother might write a letter like as she would indite it
And so her father granted it her.

And when* the letter was written, word by word, as she had
devised, then she prayed her father that she might be watched
until she were dead. <(And while my body is whole let this
letter be put into my right hand, and my hand bound fast with
the letter until that I be cold; and let me be put in a fair bed,
with all the richest clothes that I have about me. And so let
my bed, with all' my rich clothes, be laid with me in a chariot
to the next place whereas the Thames is; and there let me be
put in a barge, and but one man with me, such as ye trust, to
steer me thither, and that my barge be covered with black sam-
ite over and over. Thus, father, I beseech you let be done." So
her father granted her faithfully that all this thing should be
done like as she had devised. Then her father and her brothel

9652 SIR THOMAS MALORY

made great dole; for when this was done, anon she died. And so
when she was dead, the corpse, and the bed, and all, were led
the next way unto the Thames; and there a man, and the corpse
and all, were put in a barge on the Thames; and so the man
steered the barge to Westminster, and there he rode a great
while to and fro or any man discovered it.

So, by fortune, King Arthur and Queen Guenever were speak-
ing together at a window; and so as they looked into the Thames,
they espied the black barge, and had marvel what it might mean.
Then the King called Sir Kaye and showed him it. "Sir," said
Sir Kaye, <(wit ye well that there is some new tidings." «Go
ye thither," said the King unto Sir Kaye, <(and take with you
Sir Brandiles and Sir Agravaine, and bring me ready word what
is there." Then these three knights departed and came to the
barge and went in ; and there they found the fairest corpse, lying
in a rich bed, that ever they saw, and a poor man sitting in the
end of the barge, and no word would he speak. So these three
knights returned unto the King again, and told him what they
had found. (< That fair corpse will I see," said King Arthur.
And then the King took the Queen by the hand and went thither.
Then the King made the barge to be holden fast; and then the
King and the Queen went in with certain knights with them ; and
there they saw a fair gentlewoman, lying in a rich bed, covered
unto her middle with many rich clothes, and all was cloth of
gold: and she lay as though she had smiled. Then the Queen
espied the letter in the right hand, and told the King thereof.
Then the King took it in his hand and said, <(Now I am sure
this letter will tell what she was and why she is come hither."
Then the King and the Queen went out of the barge; and the
King commanded certain men to wait v*~ on the barge. And so
when the King was come within his chamber, he called many
knights about him and said (< that he would wit openly what was
written within that letter." Then the King broke it open and
made a clerk to read it. And this was the intent of the letter: —

<( Most noble knight, my lord, Sir Launcelot du Lake, now
hath death made us two at debate for your love. I was your
love, that men called the Fair Maiden of Astolat; therefore unco
all ladies I make my moan. Yet for my soul that ye pray, and
bury me at the least, and offer me my mass penny. This is my
last request; and a clean maid I died, I take God to my witness.
Pray for my soul, Sir Launcelot, as thou art a knight peerless.*

SIR THOMAS MALORY 9653

This was all the substance of the letter. And when it was
read, the Queen and all the knights wept for pity of the doleful
complaints. Then was Sir Launcelot sent for; and when he
was come King Arthur made the letter to be read to him. And
when Sir Launcelot had heard it, word by word, he said, <( My
lord, King Arthur, wit you well that I am right heavy of the
death of this fair damsel. God knoweth I was never causer of
her death by my will; and that I will report me unto her own
brother here, — he is Sir Lavaine. I will not say nay/ said Sir
Launcelot, <(but that she was both fair and good; and much was
I beholden unto her : but she loved me out of measure. }> <( Yp
might have showed her/ said the Queen, <( some bounty and gen-
tleness, that ye might have preserved her life." <( Madam, }> said
Sir Launcelot, (< she would none other way be answered, but that
she would be my wife, or else my love; and of these two I would
not grant her: but I proffered her for her good love, which she
showed me, a thousand pounds yearly to her and her heirs, and
to wed any manner of knight that she could find best to love in
her heart. For madam," said Sir Launcelot, (< I love not to be
constrained to love; for love must arise of the heart, and not by
constraint. w <( That is truth, }> said King Arthur and many knights :
<(love is free in himself, and never will be bound; for where he
is bound he loseth himself. >}

THE DEATH OF SIR LAUNCELOT.*
From (Morte d' Arthur. >

THEN Sir Launcelot, ever after, eat but little meat, nor drank,
but continually mourned until he was dead; and then he
sickened more and more, and dried and dwindled away.
For the bishop, nor none of his fellows, might not make him
to eat, and little he drank, that he was soon waxed shorter
by a cubit than he was, that the people could not know him.
For evermore day and night he prayed, but "needfully, as nature
required; sometimes he slumbered a broken sleep, and always
he was lying groveling upon King Arthur's and Queen Guene-
ver's tomb: and there was no comfort that the bishop, nor Sir

*The second paragraph of this eloquent passage is not to be found in the
first edition 'of the <Morte d' Arthur. > and is probably by some other writer
than Malory- This, however, does not affect its eloquence.

9654

SIR THOMAS MALORY

Bors, nor none of all his fellows could make him; it availed
nothing.

O ye mighty and pompous lords, shining in the glory transi-
tory of this unstable life, as in reigning over great realms and
mighty great countries, fortified with strong castles and towers,
edified with many a rich city; yea also, ye fierce and mighty
knights, so valiant in adventurous deeds of arms, — behold! be-
hold! see how this mighty conqueror, King Arthur, whom in
his human life all the world doubted; see also, the noble Queen
Guenever, which sometime sat in her chair, adorned with gold,
pearls, and precious stones, now lie full low in obscure foss, or
pit, covered with clods of earth and clay. Behold also this
mighty champion, Sir Launcelot, peerless of all knighthood; see
now how he lieth groveling upon the cold mold; now being
so feeble and faint, that sometime was so terrible. How, and in
what manner, ought ye to be so desirous of worldly honor, so
dangerous. Therefore, methinketh this present book is right
necessary often to be read; for in it shall ye find the most gra-
cious, knightly, and virtuous war of the most noble knights of
the world, whereby they gat a praising continually. Also me
seemeth, by the oft reading thereof, ye shall greatly desire to
accustom yourself in following of those gracious knightly deeds;
that is to say, to dread God and to love righteousness, — faith-
fully and courageously to serve your sovereign prince; and the
more that God hath given you triumphal honor, the meeker
ought ye to be, ever fearing the unstableness of this deceitful
world.

9655

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

(FOURTEENTH CENTURY)

!HE most entertaining book in early English prose is the one
entitled ( The Marvelous Adventures of Sir John Maundevile
[or Mandeville], Knight: being his Voyage and Travel which
treateth of the way to Jerusalem and of the Marvels of Ind with
other Islands and Countries.' Who this knight was, and how many
of the wondrous countries and sights he described he actually saw,
are matters of grave discussion. Some scholars have denied his very
existence, affirming the book to be merely a compilation from other
books of travel, well known at the time, and made by a French physi-
cian, Jehan de Bourgogne, who hid his identity under the pseudonym
of the English knight of St. Albans. As a matter of fact, the asser-
tion of Sir John in a Latin copy notwithstanding, research has proved
beyond doubt that the book was first written in French, and then
translated into English, Latin, Italian, German, Flemish, and even
into Irish. It has been further shown that the author drew largely
on the works of his contemporaries. The chapters on Asiatic history
and geography are from a book dictated in French at Poitiers in
1307, by the Armenian monk Hayton; the description of the Tartars
is from the work of the Franciscan monk John de Piano Carpini;
the account of Prester John is taken from the Epistle ascribed to
him, and from stories current in the fourteenth century. There are,
furthermore, large borrowings from the book of the Lombard Fran-
ciscan friar Odoric of Pordenone, who traveled in the Orient between
1317 and 1330, and on his return had his adventures set down in Latin
by a brother of his order. The itinerary of the German knight Will-
iam of Boldensele, about 1336, is also laid under contribution. What
then can be credited to Sir John ? While learned men are waxing hot
over conjectures the answers to which seem beyond the search-light
of exact investigation, the unsophisticated reader holds fast by the
testimony of the knight himself as to his own identity, accepting it
along with the marvels narrated in the book: —

<( I John Maundevile, Knight, all be it I be not worthy, that was born in
England, in the town of St. Albans, passed the sea in the year of our Lord
Jesu Christ, 1322, in the day of St. Michaelmas; and hitherto have been long
time over the Sea. and have seen and gone through many diverse Lands, and

5656 SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

many Provinces and Kingdoms and Isles, and have passed through Tartary,
Persia, Ermony [Armenia] the Little and 'the Great ; through Lybia, Chaldea,
and a great part of Ethiopia; through Amazonia, Ind the Less and the More, a
great Part; and throughout many other Isles, that be about Ind: where dwell
many diverse Folks, and of diverse Manners and Laws, and of diverse Shapes
of Men. Of which Lands and Isles I shall speak more plainly hereafter.

«And I shall advise you of some Part of things that there be, when Time
shall be hereafter, as it may best come to my Mind; and especially for them
that will and are in Purpose to visit the Holy City of Jerusalem and the
Holy Places that are thereabout. And I shall tell the way that they shall
hold hither. For I have often times passed and ridden the Way, with good
company of many Lords. God be thanked. »

And again in the epilogue: —

<(And ye shall understand, if it like you, that at mine . Home-coming, 1
came to Rome, and showed my Life to our Holy Father the Pope, . . .
and amongst all I showed him this treatise, that I had made after information
of Men that knew of things that I had not seen myself, and also of Marvels
and Customs that I had seen myself, as far as God would give me grace;
and besought his Holy Father-hood, that my Book might be examined and
corrected by Advice of his wise and discreet Council. And our Holy Father,
of his special Grace, remitted my Book to be examined and proved by the
Advice of his said Council. By the which my Book was proved true. . . .
And I John Maundevile, Knight, above said, although I be unworthy, that
departed from our Countries and passed the Sea the Year of Grace 1322, that
have passed many Lands and many Isles and Countries, and searched many
full strange Places, and have been in many a full good honorable Company,
and at many a fair Deed of Arms, albeit that I did none myself, for mine
incapable Insufficiency, now am come Home, maugre myself, to Rest. For
Gouts and Rheumatics, that distress me — those define the End of my Labor
against my Will, God knoweth.

<(And thus, taking solace in my wretched rest, recording the Time passed,
I have fulfilled these Things, and put them written in this Book, as it would
come into my Mind, the Year of Grace 1356, in the 34th year that I departed
from our countries. )J

The book professes, then, to be primarily a guide for pilgrims to
Jerusalem by four routes, with a handbook of the holy places. But
Sir John's love of the picturesque and the marvelous, and his delight
in a. good story, lead him to linger along the way : nay, to go out of
his way in order to pick up a legend or a tale wherewith to enliven
the dry facts of the route ; as if his pilgrims, weary and footsore with
long day journeys, needed a bit of diversion to cheer them along the
way. When, after many a detour, he is finally brought into Pales-
tine, the pilgrim is made to feel that every inch is holy ground.
The guide scrupulously locates even the smallest details of Bible
history. He takes it all on faith. He knows nothing of nineteenth-

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE 9657

century <( higher criticism," nor does he believe in spiritual interpre-
tation. He will point you out the

«rock where Jacob was sleeping when he saw the angels go up and down a
ladder. . . . And upon that rock sat our Lady, and learned her psalter.
. . . Also at the right side of that Dead Sea dwelleth yet the Wife of Lot
in Likeness of a Salt Stone. . . . And in that Plain is the Tomb of Job.
. . . And there is the Cistern where Joseph, which they sold, was cast in
of by his Brethren. . . . There nigh is Gabriel's Well where our Lord
was wont to bathe him, when He was young, and from that Well bare the
Water often-time to His Mother. And in that Well she washed often-time
the Clothes of her Son Jesu Christ. ... On that Hill, and in that same
Place, at the Day of Doom, 4 Angels with 4 Trumpets shall 'blow and raise
all Men that have suffered Death. »

He touches on whatever would appeal to the pious imagination
of the pilgrims, and helps them to visualize the truths of their reli-
gion. When he leaves Palestine, — a country he knew perhaps better
than ever man before or since his day, — and goes into the more
mythical regions of Ind the Little and More, Cathay and Persia, his
imagination fairly runs riot. With an Oriental love of the gorgeous
he describes the (< Royalty of the Palace of the Great Chan,^ or
of Prester John's abode, — splendors not to be outdone even by the
genie of Aladdin's wonderful lamp. He takes us into regions lustrous
with gold and silver, diamonds and other precious stones. We have
indeed in the latter half of the book whole chapters rivaling the
'Arabian Nights y in their weird luxurious imaginings, and again in
their grotesque creations of men and beasts and plant life. What
matter where Sir John got his material for his marvels, — his rich,
monster-teeming Eastern world, with its Amazons and pigmies; its
people with hound's heads, that <(be great folk and well-fighting » ; its
wild geese with two heads, and lions all white and great as oxen;
men with eyes in their shoulders, and men without heads; (<folk that
have the Face all flat, all plain, without Nose and without Mouth w ;
« folk that have great Ears and long that hang down to their Knees » ;
and (<folk that run marvelously swift with one foot so large that it
serves them as umbrella against the sun when they lie down to rest }> ;
the Hippotaynes, half man and half horse; griffins that (<have the
Body upwards as an Eagle and beneath as a Lion, and truly they
say truth, that they be of that shape. }> We find hints of many old
acquaintances of the wonder-world of story-books, and fables from
classic soil. The giants with one eye in the middle of the forehead
are close brothers to the Cyclops Polyphemus, whom Ulysses outwit-
ted. The adamant rocks were surely washed by the same seas that
swirled around the magnetic mountain whereon Sindbad the Sailor
was wrecked. Sir John was in truth a masterful borrower, levying

9658 SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

tribute on all the superstitions, the legends, the stories, and the
fables current in his time, a time when the distinction between meum
and tuum, in literature as well as in other matters, was not as finely
drawn as it is now. Whatever a man could use, he plagiarized and
considered as his own. Where the robber-baron filched by means of
the sword, Sir John filched by means of the pen. He took his mon-
sters out of Pliny, his miracles out of legends, his strange stories out
of romances. He meant to leave no rumor or invention unchronicled ;
and he prefaces his most amazing assertions with <( They say }) or
<(Men say, but I have not seen it.® He fed the gullibility of his age
to the top of its bent, and compiled a book so popular that more
copies from the fourteenth-century editions remain than of any other
book except the Bible.

THE MARVELOUS RICHES OF PRESTER JOHN
From <The Adventures >

IN THE Land of Prester John be many divers Things and
many precious Stones, so great and' so large, that Men make
of them Vessels, as Platters, Dishes, and Cups. And many
other Marvels be there, that it were too cumbrous and too long
to put in Writing of Books; but of the principal Isles and of his
Estate and of his Law, I shall tell you some Part. . . .

And he hath under him 72 Provinces, and in every Province
is a King. And these Kings have Kings under them, and all
be Tributaries to Prester John. And he hath in his Lordships
many great Marvels.

For in his Country is the Sea that Men call the Gravelly
Sea, that is all Gravel and Sand, without any Drop of W^ater, and
it ebbeth and floweth in great Waves as other Seas do, and it is
never still nor at Peace in any manner of Season. And no Man
may pass that Sea by Ship, nor by any manner of Craft, and
therefore may no Man know what Land is beyond that Sea.
And albeit that it have no Water, yet Men find therein and on
the Banks full good Fishes of other manner of Nature and shape
than Men find in any other Sea, and they be of right good
Taste and delicious for Man's Meat.

And a 3 Days' Journey long from that Sea be great Mount-
ains, out of the which goeth out a great River that cometh out
of Paradise. And it is full of precious Stones, without any Drop
of Water, and it runneth through the Desert on the one Side,

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

so that it maketh the Sea gravelly; and it runneth into that Sea,
and there it endeth. And that River runneth, also, 3 Days in
the Week and bringeth with him great Stones and the Rocks
also therewith, and that great Plenty. And anon, as they be
entered into the Gravelly Sea, they be seen no more, but lost
for evermore. And in those 3 Days that that River runneth, no
Man dare enter into it; but on other Days Men dare enter well
enough.

Also beyond that River, more upward to the Deserts, is a
great Plain all gravelly, between the Mountains. And in that
Plain, every Day at the Sun-rising, begin to grow small Trees,
and they grow till Midday, .bearing Fruit; but no Man dare take
of that Fruit, for it is a Thing of Faerie. And after Midday
they decrease and enter again into the Earth, so that at the
going down of the Sun they appear no more. And so they do,
every Day. And that is a great Marvel.

In that Desert be many Wild Men, that be hideous to look
on; for they be horned, and they speak naught, but they grunt,
as Pigs. And there is also great Plenty of wild Hounds. And
there be many Popinjays [or Parrots] that they call Psittakes in
their Language. And they speak of their own Nature, and say
( Salve! * [God save you !] to Men that go through the Deserts,
and speak to them as freely as though it were a Man that spoke.
And they that speak well have a large Tongue, and have 5 Toes
upon a Foot. And there be also some of another Manner, that
have but 3 Toes upon a Foot; and they speak not, or but little,
for they cannot but cry.

This Emperor Prester John when he goeth into Battle against
any other Lord, he hath no Banners borne before him; but he
hath 3 Crosses of Gold, fine, great, and high, full of precious
Stones, and every one of the Crosses be set in a Chariot, full
richly arrayed. And to keep every Cross, be ordained 10,000
Men of Arms and more than 100,000 Men on Foot, in manner as
when Men would keep a Standard in our Countries, when that
we be in a Land of War. . . .

He dwelleth commonly in the City of Susa. And there is
his principal Palace, that is so rich and noble that no Man will
believe it by Estimation, but he had seen it. And above the
chief Tower of the Palace be 2 round Pommels or Balls of
Gold, and in each of them be 2 Carbuncles great and large, that
shine full bright upon the Night. And the principal gates of

966o SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

his Palace be of precious Stone that Men call Sardonyx, and the
Border and the Bars be of Ivory. And the Windows of the Halls
and Chambers be of Crystal. And the Tables whereon Men eat,
some be of Emeralds, some of Amethyst, and some of Gold, full
of precious Stones; and the Pillars that bear up the Tables be
of the same precious Stones. And of the Steps to go up to
his Throne, where he sitteth at Meat, one is of Onyx, another is
of Crystal, and another of green Jasper, another of Amethyst,
another of Sardine, another of Cornelian, and the yth, that he
setteth his Feet on, is of Chrysolite. And all these Steps be
bordered with fine Gold, with the other precious Stones, set with
great orient Pearls. And the Sides of the Seat of his Throne
be of Emeralds, and bordered with Gold full nobly, and dubbed
with other precious Stones and great Pearls. And all the Pillars
in his Chamber be of fine Gold with Precious Stones, and with
many Carbuncles, that give Light upon the Night to all People.
And albeit that the Carbuncles give Light right enough, never-
theless, at all Times burneth a Vessel of Crystal full of Balm, to
give good Smell and Odor to the Emperor, and to void away all
wicked Eyes and Corruptions. >}

FROM HEBRON TO BETHLEHEM
From the < Adventures >

AND in Hebron be all the Sepultures of the Patriarchs, —
Adam, Abraham, Isaac, and of Jacob; and of their Wives,
Eve, Sarah and Rebecca and of Leah; the which Sepul-
tures the Saracens keep full carefully, and have the Place in
great Reverence for the holy Fathers, the Patriarchs that lie
there. And they suffer no Christian Man to enter into the
Place, but if it be of special Grace of the Sultan; for they hold
Christian Men and Jews as Dogs, and they say, that they should
not enter into so holy a Place. And Men call that Place, where
they lie, Double Splunk (Spelunca Duplex), or Double Cave, or
Double Ditch, forasmuch as one lieth above another. And the
Saracens call that Place in their Language, ^Karicarba* that
is to say <( The Place of Patriarchs. w And the Jews call that
Place ^Arboth? And in that same Place was Abraham's House,
and there he sat and saw 3 Persons, and worshiped but one; as
Holy Writ saith, (< Tres vidit et unum adoravit; }> that is to say,

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE 9661

saw 3 and worshiped one: w and those same were the Angels
that Abraham received ,into his House.

And right fast by that Place is a Cave in the Rock, where
Adam and Eve dwelled when they were put out of Paradise;
and there got they their Children. And in that same Place was
Adam formed and made, after that, that some Men say (for Men
were wont to call that Place the Field of Damascus, because that
it was in the Lordship of Damascus), and from thence was he
translated into the Paradise of Delights, as they say; and after
he was driven out of Paradise he was left there. And the same
Day that he was put in Paradise, the same Day he was put .out.
for anon, he sinned. There beginneth the Vale of Hebron, that
endureth nigh to Jerusalem. There the Angel commanded Adam
that he should dwell with his Wife Eve, of the which he begat
Seth; of the which Tribe, that is to say Kindred, Jesu Christ
was born.

In that Valley is a Field, where Men draw out of the Earth
a Thing that Men call Cambile, and they eat it instead of Spice,
and they bear it away to sell. And Men may not make the
Hole or the Cave, where it is taken out of the Earth, so deep or
so wide, but that it is, at the Year's End, full again up to the
Sides, through the Grace of God. . . .

From Hebron Men go to Bethlehem in half a Day. for it is
but 5 Mile; and it is a full fair Way, by Plains and Woods full
delectable. Bethlehem is a little City, long and narrow and well
walled, and on each Side enclosed with good Ditches: and it was
wont to be clept Ephrata, as Holy Writ saith, *Ecce, andimus
eum in Ephrata^ that is to say, (< Lo, we heard it in Ephrata.8
And toward the East End of the City is a full fair Church and
a gracious, and it hath many Towers, Pinnacles and Corners, full
strong and curiously made; and within that Church be 44 Pillars
of Marble, great and fair. . . .

Also besides the Choir of the Church, at the right Side, as
Men come downward 16 Steps, is the Place where our Lord was
born, that is full well adorned with Marble, and full richly
painted with Gold, Silver, Azure and other Colours. And 3
Paces beyond is the Crib of the Ox and the Ass. And beside
that is the Place where the Star fell, that led the 3 Kings, Jas-
per, Melchior and Balthazar (but Men of Greece call them thus,
<( Galgalathe, Malgalathe, and Seraphie," and the Jews call them
in this manner, in Hebrew, <(Appelius, Amerrius, and Damasus*).

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

These 3 Kings offered to our Lord, Gold, Incense and Myrrh,
and they met together through Miracle . of God ; for they met
together in a City in Ind, that Men call Cassak, that is a 53
Days' Journey from Bethlehem; and they were at Bethlehem
the 1 3th Day; and that was the 4th Day after that they had
seen the Star, when they met in that City, and thus they were
in 9 days from that City at Bethlehem, and that was a great
Miracle.

Also, under the Cloister of the Church, by 18 Steps at the
right Side, is the Charnel-house of the Innocents, where their
Bodies lie. And before the Place where our Lord was born is
the Tomb of St. Jerome, that was a Priest and a Cardinal, that
translated the Bible and the Psalter from Hebrew into Latin:
and without the Minster is the Chair that he sat in when he
translated it. And fast beside that Church, at 60 Fathom, is a
Church of St. Nicholas, where our Lady rested her after she was
delivered of our Lord; and forasmuch as she had too much Milk
in her Paps, that grieved her, she milked them on the red Stones
of Marble, so that the Traces may yet be seen, in the Stones, all
white.

And ye shall understand, that 'all that dwell in Bethlehem be
Christian Men.

And there be fair Vines about the City, and great plenty of
Wine, that the Christian Men have made. But the Saracens till
not the Vines, neither drink they any Wine: for their Books of
their Law, that Mohammet gave them, which they call their <(A1
Koran w (and some call it "Mesaph," and in another language it
is clept "Harme,") — the same Book forbiddeth them to drink
Wine. For in that Book, Mohammet cursed all those that drink
Wine and all them that sell it: for some Men say, that he slew
once an Hermit in his Drunkenness, that he loved full well; and
therefore he cursed Wine and them that drink it. But his Curse
be turned onto his own Head, as Holy Writ saith, «Et in verticem
ipsius iniquitas ejus descendet; >J that is to say, (< His Wickedness
shall turn and fall onto his own Head. w

And also the Saracens breed no Pigs, nor eat they any
Swine's Flesh, for they say it is Brother to Man, and" it was for-
bidden by the old Law; and they hold him accursed that eateth
thereof. Also in the Land of Palestine and in the Land of
Egypt, they eat but little or none of Flesh of Veal or of Beef,
but if the Beast be so old, that he may no more work for old

SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE

Age; for it is forbidden, because they have but few of them;
therefore they nourish them to till their Lands.

In this City of Bethlehem was David the King born; and he
had 60 Wives, and the first wife was called Michal; and also he
had 300 Lemans.

And from Bethlehem unto Jerusalem is but 2 Mile; and in
the Way to Jerusalem half a Mile from Bethlehem is a Church,
where the Angel said to the Shepherds of the Birth of Christ.
And in that Way is the Tomb of Rachel, that was the Mother
of Joseph the Patriarch; and she died anon after that she was
delivered of her Son Benjamin. And there she was buried by
Jacob her Husband; and he made set 12 great Stones on her, in
Token that she had born 12 Children. In the same Way, half a
Mile from Jerusalem, appeared the Star to the 3 Kings. In that
Way also be many Churches of Christian Men, by the which Men
go towards the City of Jerusalem.

9664

JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN

1803-1849

,N THE summer of 1894 some workmen engaged in removing a
mass of rubbish, to make room for a new building in one of
the poorer quarters of Dublin, came upon the ruins of an
old cellar. A casual passer-by happened to notice the old wall, with
its low window looking out upon a level with the narrow and squalid
alley. Moved by some bookish recollection, he realized that he was
standing at the corner of Bride Street and Myler's Alley, known in
the older days as Glendalough Lane; and that the miserable vestige
of human habitation into which the rough navvies were driving their
pickaxes had once been the poor shelter of him who, —

«Worn by weakness, disease, and wrong,

Had fled for shelter to God, who mated
His soul with song.»

From this spot James Clarence Mangan, wasted with famine and
already delirious, was carried by the Overseers of the Poor to the
sheds of Meath Hospital in June 1849; too late, alas! to save the
dying man, who in the years of his young manhood had sung and
suffered for Ireland. A few friends gathered about him to comfort
his patient and gentle soul, and to lay his bones in the cool clay of
Glasnevin.

The life of Mangan is a convincing proof that differences of time
and place have no influence upon the poet's power. Poverty and
Want were the foster-brothers of this most wonderful of Ireland's
gifted children. His patient body was chained to daily labor for the
sordid needs of an unappreciating kindred, and none of the pleasant
joys of travel and of diversified nature were his. He was born in
Fishamble Street, Dublin, in 1803, and never passed beyond the con-
fines of his native city; but his spirit was not jailed by the misery
which oppressed his body. His wondrous fancy swept with a con-
queror's march through all the fair broad universe.

Like Poe and Chatterton, Mangan impaired his powers by the use
of intoxicants. He was very sensitive about the squalor of his sur-
roundings, and was reticent and shy in the company of more fortu-
nate men and women: but with admirable unselfishness he devoted
his days, his toil, and the meagre rewards which came to him from
his work, to the care and sustenance of his mean-spirited kindred.

JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN 9665

For years he labored in the hopeless position of a scrivener's clerk,
from which he was rescued by the interest of Dr. Todd, and was
made an assistant librarian of Trinity College. There it was his
habit to spend hours of rapt and speechless labor amid the dusty
shelves, to earn his pittance. Dr. Petrie subsequently found him a
place in the office of the Irish Ordnance Survey; but Mangan was
his own enemy and foredoomed to defeat. He wielded a vigorous
pen in Ireland's cause, and under various names communicated his
own glowing spirit to his countrymen through the columns of several
periodicals. He published also two volumes of translations from the
German poets, which are full of his own lyric fire but have no claim
to fidelity. It was in his gloomy cellar-home that he poured out the
music of his heart. When he died, a volume of German poetry was
found in his pocket, and there were loose papers on which he had
feebly traced his last thoughts in verse. Mangan will forever remain
a cherished comrade of all gentle lovers of the Beautiful and True.

THE DAWNING OF THE DAY

WAS a balmy summer morning
Warm and early,

Such as only June bestows;

Everywhere the earth adorning,

Dews lay pearly
In the lily-bell and rose.
Up from each green-leafy bosk and hollow

Rose the blackbird's pleasant lay;
And the soft cuckoo was sure to follow:
'Twas the dawning of the day!

Through the perfumed air the golden

Bees flew round me;
Bright fish dazzled from the sea,
Till medreamt some fairy olden-
World spell bound me
In a trance of witcherie.
Steeds pranced round anon with stateliest housings,

Bearing riders prankt in rich array,
Like flushed revelers after wine-carousings :
'Twas the dawning of the day!

Then a strain of song was chanted,

And the lightly
Floating sea-nymphs drew anear.

0666 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN

Then again the shore seemed haunted

By hosts brightly

Clad, and wielding shield and spear!
Then came battle shouts — an onward rushing —

Swords, and chariots, and a phantom fray.
Then all vanished: the warm skies were blushing
In the dawning of the day!

Cities girt with glorious gardens,

Whose immortal
Habitants in robes of light
Stood, methought, as angel-wardens

Nigh each portal,
Now arose to daze my sight.
Eden spread around, revived and blooming;
When — lo! as I gazed, all passed away:
I saw but black rocks and billows looming
In the dim chill dawn of day!

THE NAMELESS ONE

OLL forth, my song, like the rushing river

That sweeps along to the mighty sea;
God will inspire me while I deliver
My soul of thee!

Tell thou the world, when my bones lie whitening

Amid the last homes of youth and eld,
That there was once one whose veins ran lightning
No eye beheld.

Tell how his boyhood was one drear night hour;

How shone for him, through his griefs and gloom,
No star of all heaven sends to light our
Path to the tomb.

Roll on, my song, and to after ages

Tell how, disdaining all earth can give,
He would have taught men, from wisdom's pages,
The way to live.

And tell how, trampled, derided, hated,

And worn by weakness, disease, and wrong,
He fled for shelter to God, who mated
His soul with song —

JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN 9657

With song which alway, sublime or vapid,

Flowed like a rill in the morning beam,
Perchance not deep, but intense and rapid —
A mountain stream.

Tell how this Nameless, condemned for years long

To herd with demons from hell beneath,
Saw things that made him, with groans and tears, long
For even death.

Go on to tell how, with genius wasted,

Betrayed in friendship, befooled in love,
With spirit shipwrecked, and young hopes blasted,
He still, still strove.

Till, spent with toil, dreeing death for others,

And some whose hands should have wrought for him
(If children live not for sires and mothers),
His mind grew dim.

And he fell far through that pit abysmal, —

The gulf and grave of Maginn and Burns, —
And pawned his soul for the devil's dismal
Stock of returns.

But yet redeemed it in days of darkness,

And shapes and signs of the final wrath,

When death, in hideous and ghastly starkness,

Stood on his path.

And tell how now, amid wreck and sorrow,

And want, and sickness, and houseless nights,
He bides in calmness the silent morrow,
That no ray lights.

And lives he still, then ? Yes : old and hoary

At thirty-nine, from despair and woe,
He lives, enduring what future story
Will never know.

Him grant a grave too, ye pitying noble,

Deep in your bosoms! There let him dwell?
He too had tears for all souls in trouble
Here and in hell.

,9668 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN

ST. PATRICKS HYMN BEFORE TARAH

AT TARAH to-day, in this awful hour,
I call on the fcoly Trinity:
Glory to him who reigneth in power,
The God of the elements, Father and Son
And Paraclete Spirit, which Three are the One,
The ever-existing Divinity!

At Tarah to-day I call on the Lord,
On Christ, the omnipotent Word,
Who came to redeem from death and sin

Our fallen race;
And I put and I place
The virtue that lieth and liveth in
His incarnation lowly.
His baptism pure and holy,
His life of toil and tears and affliction,
His dolorous death — his crucifixion,
His burial, sacred and sad and, lone,

His resurrection to life again,
His glorious ascension to Heaven's high throne*
And, lastly, his future dread

And terrible coming to judge all men —
Both the living and dead. . . .

At Tarah to-day I put and I place

The virtue that dwells in the seraphim's love,
And the virtue and grace

That are in the obedience
And unshaken allegiance
Of all the archangels and angels above,
And in the hope of the resurrection
To everlasting reward and election,
And in the prayers of the fathers of old,
And in the truths the prophets foretold,
And in the Apostles' manifold preachings,
And in the confessors' faith and teachings;
And in the purity ever dwelling

Within the immaculate Virgin's breast,
And in the actions bright and excelling

Of all good men, the just and the blest. , ,

At Tarah to-day, in this fateful hour,
I place all heaven with its power,

JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN 9669

And the sun with its brightness,

And the snow with its whiteness,

And fire with all the strength it hath,

And lightning with its rapid wrath,

And the winds with their swiftness along their path,

And the sea with its deepness,

And the rocks with their steepness,

And the earth with its starkness, —

All these I place,

By God's almighty help and grace,
Between myself and the powers of darkness.

At Tarah to-day
May God be my stay! •
May the strength of God now nerve me!
May the power of God preserve me!
May God the Almighty be near me!
May God the Almighty espy me!
May God the Almighty hear me!

May God give me eloquent speech!
May the arm of God protect me!
May the wisdom of God direct me!
May God give me power to teach and to preach!

May the shield of God defend me!

May the host of God attend me,
And ward me,
And guard me

Against the wiles of demons and devils,
Against the temptations of vices and evils,
Against the bad passions and wrathful will

Of the reckless mind and the wicked heart,—
Against every man who designs me ill,

Whether leagued with others or plotting apart!

In this hour of hours,
I place all those powers
Between myself and every foe
Who threaten my body and soul

With danger or dole,

To protect me against the evils that flow
From lying soothsayers' incantations,
From the gloomy laws of the Gentile nations,
From heresy's hateful innovations,
From idolatry's rites and invocations.

9670 JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN

Be those my defenders,

My guards against every ban —

And spell of smiths, and Druids, and women;

In fine, against every knowledge that renders

The light Heaven sends us dim in

The spirit and soul of man!

May Christ, I pray,
Protect me to-day
Against poison and fire,
Against drowning and wounding;
That so, in His grace abounding,
I may earn the preacher's hire!

Christ as a light

T11 J -J I

Illumine and guide me!

Christ as a shield o'ershadow and cover me!

Christ be under me! — Christ be over me I
Christ be beside me,
On left hand and right!

Christ be before me, behind nie, about me,

Christ this day be within and without me!

Christ, the lowly and meek.

Christ the Ail-Powerful be
In the heart of each to whom I speak,
In the mouth of each who speaks to me?

In all who draw near me,

Or see me or hear me!

At Tarah to-day, in this awful hour,

I call on the Holy Trinity!
Glory to Him who reigneth in power,
The God of the elements, Father and Son
And Paraclete Spirit, which Three are the One,
The ever-existing Divinity!

Salvation dwells with the Lord,
With Christ, the omnipotent Word.
From generation to generation
Grant us, O Lord, thy grace and salvation;

9671

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

(1785-1873)

BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN

[LESSANDRO MANZONI was looked upon during his life as a man
who had deserved well of Heaven. (<He gazed, » as one of
his countrymen said, <(at Fortune straight in the eyes, and
Fortune smiled. }> And Manzoni might well have looked with clear
eyes, for there was nothing in his heart — if a man's heart may be
judged from his constant utterances — that was base.

He lived in a time best suited to his genius and his temperament.
And his genius and his time made an epoch in Italian history worthy
of most serious study. In 1815 Italy was
inarticulate; she had to speak by signs.
She dared only dream of a future which
she read in a glorious past. The Austrians
ruled the present, the future was veiled,
the past was real and golden. Manzoni,
Pellico, and Grossi were romanticists be-
cause they were filled with aspiration; and
their aspiration, clothing itself in the form
which Goethe's < Gotz> and Sir Walter Scott's
<Marmion) had given to the world, tried to
obliterate the present and find relief at the
foot of the cross in the shadow of old Gothic
cathedrals. The Comte de Mun, Vicomte
de Vogue, Sienkiewicz, and others of the

modern neo-Catholic school, represent reaction rather than aspiration.
Manzoni, Chateaubriand, Montalembert, Overbeck in art, Lamartine
and Lamennais, were not only fiercely reactionary, but fiercely senti-
mental, hopeful, and romantic.

With Austrian bayonets at the throat of Italy, it was not easy
to emit loud war-cries for liberty. The desire of the people must
therefore be heard through the voice of the poet. . And the desire of
the Italians is manifest in the poetry and the prose of the author of
<The Betrothed > (I Promessi Sposi), and the < Sacred Hymns.* Only
two reproaches were made against Manzoni: he was praised by Goe-
the,— which, (( says a sneer turned proverb, w as Mr. Howells puts it,
<(is a brevet of mediocrity, w — and he was not persecuted. <( Goethe, x>

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

9672

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

Mr. Howells continues, (< could not laud Manzoni's tragedies too highly;
he did not find one word too much or too little in them; the style
was free, noble, full, and rich. As to the religious lyrics, the manner
of their treatment was fresh and individual although the matter and
the significance were not new, and the poet was (a Christian without
fanaticism, a Roman Catholic without bigotry, a zealot without hard-
ness.>})

In 1815 the Continental revolt against the doctrines of Rousseau
and Voltaire was at its highest. The period that produced Cesare
Cantu was likewise the period when Ossian and Byron had become
the favorite poets of the younger men. Classicism and infidelity were
both detested. The last king was not, after all, to be strangled with
the entrails of the last priest. (<God might rest,*' as a writer on the
time remarks with naivete. It was the fashion to be respectful to
him. Italy was willing to disown the paganism of the Renaissance
for the moral teaching of the ages that preceded it. Manzoni and
his school held that true patriotism must be accompanied by virtue;
and in a country where Machiavelli's ( Prince } had become a classic,
this seemed a new doctrine. The movement which Manzoni repre-
sented was above all religious; the pope was again transfigured, and
in his case by a man who had begun life with the most liberal tenden-
cies. As it was, he never accepted the belief that the pope must
necessarily be a ruler of great temporalities; but of the sincerity
and fervor of his faith in the Catholic Church one finds ample proof
in his ( Sacred Hymns.'

Born at Milan in 1785, he married Mademoiselle Blondel in 1808.
Her father was a banker of Geneva; and tradition says that he was
of that cultivated group of financiers to whom the Neckers belonged,
and that his daughter was of a most dazzling blonde beauty. The
Blondels, like the Neckers, were Protestants; but at Milan, Louise
Blondel entered the Catholic Church and confirmed the wavering
faith of her young husband, who began at once the ( Sacred Hymns. }
In these Mr. Howells praises <( the irreproachable taste and unaffected
poetic appreciation of the grandeur of Christianity, w One may go
even further; for they have the fervor, the exultation, the knowledge
that the Redeemer liveth, in a fullness which we do not find in sacred
song outside the Psalms of David, the < Dies Irae,* and the ( Stabat
Mater. >

Manzoni's poems were not many, but they all have the element of
greatness in them. We can understand why the invading Austrians
desired to honor him, when we read his ode ( The Fifth of May* (on
the death of Napoleon), or his two noble tragedies <The Count of
Carmagnola* and <Adelchi,> or that pride of all Italians, his master-
piece, < The Betrothed > (< I Promessi Sposi >X We can understand too

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

9673

the lofty haughtiness that induced him to refuse these honors, and
to relinquish his hereditary title of Count, rather than submit to the
order that he must register himself as an Austrian subject. The gov-
ernment, however, did not cease to offer honors to him; all of which,
except the Italian senatorship proffered him in 1860, he declined.
Great tragedies, like Shelley's 'Cenci,* Sir Henry Taylor's Philip van
Artevelde,' and Sir Aubrey De Vere's (Mary Tudor, } may be unact-
able; they may speak best to the heart and mind only through the
written word. Manzoni's are of this class. They have elevation,
dramatic feeling, the power of making emotion vital and of inspiring
passionate sympathy with the intention of the author; but even Sal-
vini, Rossi, or Ristori could not make them possible for the stage.
In the ( Count of Carmagnola,* which celebrated the physical ruin but
moral success of a noble man, Manzoni in 1820 shocked the classicists
and won their hatred. They loved Aristotle and his rules; Manzoni
broke every rule as thoroughly as Shakespeare and as consciously as
Victor Hugo. He was looked upon as a literary, artistic apostate. In
his explanation of his reasons for this assault on an old world, he
makes an audacious apologia which Alfred de Musset might have read
with profit before despairing of a definition of romanticism, ^delchi*
followed in 1822, still further exasperating the fury of the classicists,
who hated Manzoni and romance ; foreseeing perhaps by intuition that
the romantic school was to be the ancestor of the realistic school,
whose horrors were only dimly dreamed of.

The < Sacred Hymns, > <The Count of Carmagnola,> <Adelchi,> < The
Betrothed,* and the great ( Fifth of May) ode on the death of Napo-
leon, are the works by which Manzoni's fame was established. The
tragedies — c Carmagnola * of the fifteenth century, ( Adelchi y of the
eighth — would live for their strong lyrical element, even were the
quality of eloquence and the fire that must underlie eloquence lack-
ing. Pathos is exquisite in both these plays; the marble hearts
of the Italian classic tragedy are replaced here by vital, palpitating
flesh. When Carmagnola dies for his act of humanity in releasing
his prisoners of war, and Ermengarda, whose loveliness is portrayed
with the delicacy of the hand that drew Elaine, passes away in her
convent, one feels that the world may indeed mourn. And when a
poet can force us to- take the shades of the Middle Ages for real
human beings, no man may deny his gift.

( The Fifth of May,* the noblest ode in the Italian language,
almost defies translation. Mr. Howells has made the best possible
version of it. Napoleon had wronged Italy, but Italy speaking
through its poet forgave him.

(< Beautiful, deathless, beneficent,
Faith ! used to triumphs even

9674 ALESSANDRO MANZONI

This also writes exultingly;

No loftier pride 'neath heaven
Unto the shame of Calvary

Stooped ever yet its crest.
Thou from his weary mortality

Disperse all bitter passions;
The God that humbleth and hearteneth,

That comforts and that chastens.
Upon the pillow else desolate

To his pale lips lay pressed !»

<The Betrothed } is one of the classics of fiction. It appeared in
1825. Since that time it has been translated into every language in
the civilized world. It deserves the verdict which time has passed
upon it. Don Abbondio and Cardinal Federigo Borromeo, Renzo and
Lucia, and Don Rodrigo, go on from year to year seeming to gain
new vitality. It will bear the test of a reading in youth and a re-
reading in old age; and there are few books of fiction of which this
can be said, — it is a standard of their greatness.

Manzoni died in 1873. His patriotic dreams had not been entirely
realized; but he passed away content, in faith and hope. His career
was on the whole happy and serene. He loved the simple things of
life, and looked on life itself as only a vestibule — to be nobly
adorned, however — to a place of absolute peace.

Arnaud's (I Poetti Patriottica> (1862); (Storia della Litteratura
Italiana,* by De Sanctis (1879); and William Dean Howells's ( Modern
Italian Poets } (Harper & Brothers: 1887), — are valuable books of ref-
erence on the romantic movement in Italy, and on the position of
Manzoni in that movement. The best translation of ( The Betrothed >
is included in the Bonn Library.

AN UNWILLING PRIEST
From <The Betrothed >

[The following amusing scene occurs in the earlier portion of Manzoni's
novel. Don Abbondio, a cowardly village curate, has been warned by Don
Rodrigo, his lord of the manor, that if he dares to unite in marriage two
young peasants, Renzo and Lucia (the « betrothed » of the story), vengeance
will follow. The priest accordingly shirks his duty; and cruelly refusing to
set any marriage date, shuts himself up in his house and even barricades him-
self against Renzo's entreaties. Donna Agnese, the mother of Lucia, hears
that if a betrothed pair can but reach the presence of their parish priest and

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9675

announce that they take each other as man and wife, the marriage is as bind-
ing as if celebrated with all formality. Accordingly Agnese devises a sort of
attack on the priest by stratagem, to be managed by the parties to the con-
tract and two witnesses (the brothers Tonio and Gervase) ; which device is con-
siderably endangered by the wariness of the curate's housekeeper, Perpetua.]

IN FRONT of Don Abbondio's door, a narrow street ran between
two cottages; but only continued straight the length of the

buildings, and then turned into the fields. Agnese went for-
ward along this street, as if she would go a little aside to speak
more freely, and Perpetua followed. When they had turned the
corner, and reached a spot whence they could no longer see what
happened before Don Abbondio's house, Agnese coughed Icudly.
This was the signal; Renzo heard it, and re-animating Lucia
by pressing her arm, they turned the corner together on tiptoe,
crept very softly close along the wall, reached the door, and
gently pushed it open : quiet, and stooping low, they were quickly
in the passage; and here the two brothers were waiting for them.
Renzo very gently let down the latch of the door, and they all
four ascended the stairs, making scarcely noise enough for two.
On reaching the landing, the two brothers advanced towards
the door of the room at the side of the staircase, and the lovers
stood close against the wall.

^Deo gratias* said Tonio in an explanatory tone.

(< Eh, Tonio ! is it you ? Come in ! }) replied the voice within.

Tonio opened the door, scarcely wide enough to admit himself
and his brother one at a time. The ray of light that suddenly
shone through the opening and crossed the dark floor of the
landing made Lucia tremble, as if she were discovered. When
the brothers had entered, Tonio closed the door inside: the lov-
ers stood motionless in the dark, their ears intently on the alert,
and holding their breath; the loudest noise was the beating of
poor Lucia's heart.

Don Abbondio was seated, as we have said, in an old arm-
chair, enveloped in an antiquated dressing-gown, and his head
buried in a shabby cap of the shape of a tiara, which by the
faint light of a small lamp formed a sort of cornice all around
his face. Two thick locks which escaped from beneath his head-
dress, two thick eyebrows, two thick mustachios, and a thick tuft
on the chin, all of them gray and scattered over his dark and
wrinkled visage, might be compared to bushes covered with snow,
projecting from the face of a cliff, as seen by moonlight.

9676

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

"Aha!" was his salutation, as he took off his spectacles and
laid them on his book.

(< The Signer Curate will say I am come very late, " said Tonio
with a low bow, which Gervase awkwardly imitated.

(< Certainly, it is late — late every way. Don't you know I
am ill?»

(<I'm very sorry for it."

<(You must have heard I was ill, and didn't know when I
should be able to see anybody. . . . But why have you
brought this — this boy with you ? "

"For company, Signor Curate."

<(Very well, let us see."

<(Here are twenty- five new berlinghe, with the figure of Saint
Ambrose on horseback," said Tonio, drawing a little parcel out
of his pocket.

" Let us see, " said Don Abbondio ; and he took the parcel, put
on his spectacles again, opened it, took out the berlinghe, turned
them over and over, counted them, and found them irreprehen-
sible.

"Now, Signor Curate, you will give me Tecla's necklace."

" You are right, " replied Don Abbondio ; and going to a
cupboard, he took out a key, looking around as if to see that all
prying spectators were at a proper distance, opened one of the
doors, and filling up the aperture with his person, introduced his
head to see and his arm to reach the pledge; then drawing it
out, he shut the cupboard, unwrapped the paper, and saying,
" Is that right ? " folded it up again and handed it to Tonio.

C( Now, " said Tonio, (( will you please to put it in black and
white ? "

(( Not satisfied yet ! " said Don Abbondio. <( I declare they
know everything. Eh ! how suspicious the world has become !
Don't you trust me ? "

"What, Signor Curate! Don't I trust you? You do me
wrong. But as my name is in your black books, on the debtor's
side — Then, since you have had the trouble of writing once,
so — From life to death — "

"Well, well," interrupted Don Abbondio; and muttering be-
tween his teeth, he drew out one of the table drawers, took thence
pen, ink, and paper, and began to write, repeating the words
aloud as they proceeded from his pen. In the mean time Tonio,
and at his side Gervase, placed themselves standing before the

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9677

table in such a manner as to conceal the door from the view of
the writer, and began to shuffle their feet about on the floor, as
if in mere idleness, but in reality as a signal to those without
to enter, and at the same time to drown the noise of their foot-
steps. Don Abbondio, intent upon his writing, noticed nothing
else. At the noise of their feet, Renzo took Lucia's arm, pressing
it in an encouraging manner, and went forward, almost dragging
her along; for she trembled to such a degree that without his
help she must have sunk to the ground. Entering very softly,
on tiptoe, and holding their breath, they placed themselves be-
hind the two brothers. In the mean time, Don Abbondio, having
finished writing, read over the paper attentively, without raising
his eyes; he then folded it up, saying, ((Are you content now ? »
and taking off his spectacles with one hand, handed the paper to
Tonio with the other, and looked up. Tonio, extending his right
hand to receive it, retired on one side, and Gervase, at a sign
from him, on the other; and behold! as at the shifting of a scene,
Renzo and Lucia stood between them. Don Abbondio saw indis-
tinctly— saw clearly — was terrified, astonished, enraged, buried in
thought, came to a resolution; and all this while Renzo uttered
the words, (( Signor Curate, in the presence of these witnesses,
this is my wife." Before, however, Lucia's lips could form the
reply, Don Abbondio dropped the receipt, seized the lamp with
his left hand and raised it in the air, caught hold of the cloth
with his right, and dragged it furiously off the table, bringing
to the ground in its fall, book, paper, inkstand, and sand-box;
and springing between the chair and the table, advanced towards
Lucia. The poor girl, with her sweet gentle voice, trembling
violently, had scarcely uttered the words, <(And this — w when
Don Abbondio threw the cloth rudely over her head and face, to
prevent her pronouncing the entire formula. Then, letting the
light fall from his other hand, he employed both to wrap the
cloth round her face, till she was well-nigh smothered, shouting
in the mean while, at the stretch of his voice, like a wounded
bull, (< Perpetual Perpetual — treachery! — help!" The light, just
glimmering on the ground, threw a dim and flickering ray upon
Lucia, who, in utter consternation, made no attempt to disengage
herself, and might be compared to a statue sculptured in chalk,
over which the artificer had thrown a wet cloth. When the light
died away, Don Abbondio quitted the poor girl, and went grop-
ing about to find the door that opened into an inner room: and

9678

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

having reached it, he entered and shut himself in, unceasingly
exclaiming, (< Perpetua ! treachery ! help ! Out of the house ! Out
of the house ! })

In the other room all was confusion: Renzo, seeking to lay
hold of the Curate, and feeling with his hands, as if playing at
blindman's buff, had reached the door, and kicking against it,
was crying, "Open, open; don't make such a noise !}) Lucia,
calling to Renzo in a feeble voice, said beseechingly, <( Let us go,
let us go, for God's sakeo" Tonio was crawling on his knees,
and feeling with his hands on the ground to recover his lost
receipt. The terrified Gervase was crying and jumping about,
and seeking for the door of the stairs, so as to make his escape
in safety.

In the midst of this uproar, we cannot but stop a moment to
make a reflection. Renzo, who was causing disturbance at night
in another person's house, who had effected an entrance by
stealth, and who had blockaded the master himself in one of his
own rooms, has all the appearance of an oppressor; while in fact
he was the oppressed. Don Abbondio, taken by surprise, terrified
and put to flight, while peaceably engaged in his own affairs,
appears the victim; when in reality it was he who did the wrong.
Thus frequently goes the world; — or rather, we should say, thus
it went in the seventeenth century.

The besieged, finding that the enemy gave no signs of aban-
doning the enterprise, opened a window that looked into the
church-yard, and shouted out, (( Help ! help ! >} There was a most
lovely moon; the shadow of the church, and a little farther on
the long sharp shadow of the bell-tower, lay dark, still, and well
defined, on the bright grassy level of the sacred inclosure: all
objects were visible, almost as by day. But look which way you
would, there appeared no sign of living person. Adjoining the
lateral wall of the church, on the side next the parsonage, was a
small dwelling where the sexton slept Aroused by this unusual
cry, he sprang up in his bed, jumped out in great haste, threw
open the sa'sh of his little window, put his head out with his
eyelids glued together all the while, and cried out, (< What's the
matter ? »

tt Run, Ambrogio I help ! people in the house i )} answered Don
Abbondio. a Coming directly, >J replied he? as he drew in his
head and shut the window; and although half asleep and more
than half terrified, an expedient quickly occurred to him that

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9679

would bring more aid than had been asked, without dragging him
into the affray, whatever it might be. Seizing his breeches that
lay upon the bed, he tucked them under his arm like a gala hat,
and bounding down-stairs by a little wooden ladder, ran to the
belfry, caught hold of the rope that was attached to the larger
of the two bells, and pulled vigorously.

Ton, ton, ton, ton: the peasant sprang up in his bed; the
boy stretched in the hay-loft listened eagerly, and leapt upon
his feet « What's the matter? what's the matter? The bell 's
ringing! Fire? Thieves? Banditti?" Many of the women
advised, begged, their husbands not to stir — to let others run;
some got up and went to the window; those who were cowards,
as if yielding to entreaty, quietly slipped under the bedclothes
again; while the more inquisitive and courageous sprang up and
armed themselves with pitchforks and pistols, to run to the up-
roar; others waited to see the end. . . .

Renzo, who had more of his senses about him than the rest,
remembered that they had better make their escape one way
or another before the crowds assembled; and that the best plan
would be to do as Menico advised, — nay, commanded, with the
authority of one in terror. When once on their way, and out of
the tumult and danger, he could ask a clearer explanation from
the boy. (< Lead the way," said he to Menico; and addressing
the women, said, <( Let us go with him." They therefore quickly
turned their steps towards the church, crossed the church -yard,
• — where, by the favor of Heaven, there was not yet a living
creature, — entered a little street that ran between the church
and Don Abbondio's house, turned into the first alley they came
to, and then took the way of the fields.

They had not perhaps gone fifty yards, when the crowd
began to collect in the church-yard, and rapidly increased every
moment. They looked inquiringly in each other's faces; every
one had a question to ask, but no one could return an answer.
Those who arrived first ran to the church door: it was locked.
They then ran to the belfry outside; and one of them, putting
his mouth to a very small window, a sort of loophole, cried,
(< What ever is the matter ? " As soon as Ambrogio recognized a
known voice, he let go of the bell-rope, and being assured by
the buzz that many people had assembled, replied, (( I'll open
the door." Hastily slipping on the apparel he had carried undet
his arm, he went inside the church and opened the door.

9680

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

«What is all this hubbub? — What is it? — Where is it?—
Who is it?»

<( Why, who is it ? " said Ambrogio, laying1 one hand on the
door-post, and with the other holding up the habiliment he had
put on in such haste: <(What! don't you know? People in the
Signor Curate's house. Up, boys; help!" Hearing this, they all
turned to the house, looked up, approached it in a body, looked
up again, listened: all was quiet. Some ran to the street door;
it was shut and bolted: they glanced upwards; not a window was
open, not a whisper was to be heard.

(< Who is within ? — Ho ! Hey ! — Signor Curate ! — Signor
Curate !»

Don Abbondio, who, scarcely aware of the flight of the in-
vaders, had retired from the window and closed it, and who at
this moment was reproaching Perpetua in a low voice for having
left him alone in this confusion, was obliged, when he heard him-
self called upon by the voice of the assembled people, to show
himself again at the window; and when he saw the crowds that
had come to his aid, he sorely repented having called them.

<( What has happened ? — What have they done to you ? — Who
are they? — Where are they?" burst forth from fifty voices at
once.

(< There's nobody here now: thank you; go home again."

(< But who has been here ? — Where are they gone ? — What
has happened ? "

<( Bad people, people who go about by night ; but they're gone :
go home again; there is no longer anything; another time, my
children: I thank you for your kindness to me." So saying, he
drew back and shut the window. Some of the crowd began to
grumble, some to joke, others to curse; some shrugged their
shoulders and took their departure. .

The melancholy trio continued their walk, the women taking
the lead and Renzo behind to act as guard. Lucia clung closely
to her mother's arm, kindly and dexterously avoiding the prof-
fered assistance of the youth at the difficult passes of this unfre-
quented path; feeling ashamed of herself, even in such troubles,
for having already been so long and so familiarly alone with
him, while expecting in a few moments to be his wife. Now
that this vision had been so sorrowfully dispelled, she repented
having proceeded thus far; and amidst so many causes of fear,
she feared even for her modesty; — not such modesty as arises

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 968l

from the sad knowledge of evil, but for that which is ignorant
of its own existence; like the dread of a child who trembles in
the dark, he knows not why.

"And the house ? w suddenly exclaimed Agnese. But however
important the object might be which extorted this exclamation,
no one replied, because no one could do so satisfactorily. They
therefore continued their walk in silence, and in a little while
reached the square before the church of the convent.

Renzo advanced to the door of the church, and gently' pushed
it open. The moon that entered through the aperture fell upon
the pale face and silvery beard of Father Cristoforo, who was
standing here expecting them; and having seen that no one
was missing, <( God be praised ! >} said he, beckoning to them to
enter. By his side stood another Capuchin, the lay sexton, whom
he had persuaded by prayers and arguments to keep vigil with
him, to leave the door ajar, and to remain there on guttrd to
receive these poor threatened creatures; and it required nothing
short of the authority of the Father, and of his fame as a saint,
to persuade the layman to so inconvenient, perilous, and irregu-
lar a condescension. When they were inside, Father Cristoforo
very softly shut the door. Then the sexton could no longer con-
tain himself, and taking the Father aside, whispered in his ear.
<( But, Father, Father ! at night — in church — with women — shut
— the rule — but, Father ! w And he shook his head, while thus
hesitatingly pronouncing these words. Just see! thought Father
Cristoforo: if it were a pursued robber, Friar Fazio would make
no difficulty in the world; but a poor innocent escaping from
the jaws of a wolf — ^Omnia munda mundis** added he, turn-
ing suddenly to Friar Fazio, and forgetting that he did not under-
stand Latin. But this forgetfulness was exactly what produced
the right effect. If the Father had begun to dispute and reason,
Friar Fazio would not have failed to urge opposing arguments,
and no one knows how and when the discussion would have come
to an end; but at the sound of these weighty words of a mys-
terious signification, and so resolutely uttered, it seemed to him
that in them must be contained the solution of all his doubts.
He acquiesced, saying, <(Very well: you know more about it than
1 do.»

*Or in reverse, <(To the pure all things are pure.»

9682

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

<( Trust me, then," replied Father Cristoforo; ana by the
dim light of the lamp burning before the altar, he approached
the refugees, who stood waiting in suspense, and said to them,
(< My children, thank God, who has delivered you from so great
a danger! Perhaps at this moment — M And here he began to
explain more fully what he had hinted by the little messen-
ger; little suspecting that they knew more than he, and sup-
posing that Menico had found them quiet in their own house,
before the arrival of the ruffians. Nobody undeceived him,—
not even Lucia, whose conscience, however, was all the while
secretly reproaching her for practicing such dissimulation with so
good a man; but it was a night of embarrassment and dissimula-
tion.

(( After this, }> continued he, <( you must feel, my children, that
the village is no longer safe for you. It is yours, who were
born there, and you have done no wrong to any one; but God
wills it so. It is a trial, my children; bear it with patience and
faith, without indulging in rancor, and rest assured there will
come a day when you will think yourselves happy that this has
occurred. I have thought of a refuge for you, for the present.
Soon, I hope, you may be able to return in safety to your own
house; at any rate; God will provide what is best for you; and I
assure you, I will be careful not to prove unworthy of the favor
he has bestowed upon me, in choosing me as his minister, in
the service of you his poor yet loved afflicted ones. You,)} con-
tinued he, turning to the two women, <( can stay at . Here

you will be far enough from every danger, and at the same
time not far from your own home. There seek out our con-
vent, ask for the guardian, and give him this letter: he will be
to you another Father Cristoforo. And you, my Renzo, must
put yourself in safety from the anger of others, and your own.
Carry this letter to Father Bonaventura da Lodi, in our convent
of the Porta Orientale, at Milan. He will be a father to you,
will give you directions and find you work, till you can return
and live more peaceably. Go to the shore of the lake, near
the mouth of the Bione, a river not far from this monastery.
Here you will see a boat waiting ; say, ( Boat ! > It will be asked
you, ( For whom ? > And you must reply, ( San Francesco. } The
boat will receive^you and carry you to the other side, where you
will find a cart that will take you straight to .*

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

9683

If any one asks how Father Cristoforo had so quickly at his
disposal these means of transport by land and water, it will show
that he does not know the influence and power of a Capuchin
held in reputation as a saint.

It still remained to decide about the care of the houses.
The Father received the keys, pledging himself to deliver them
to whomsoever Renzo and Agnese should name. The latter, in
delivering up hers, heaved a deep sigh, remembering that at that
moment the house was open, that the devil had been there, and
who knew what remained to be taken care of !

(< Before you go," said the Father, <( let us pray all together
that the Lord may be with you in this your 'journey, and for
ever; and above all, that he may give you strength and a spirit
of love, to enable you to desire whatever he has willed. }) So
saying, he knelt down in the middle of the church, and they all
followed his example.

After praying a few moments in silence, with a low but dis-
tinct voice he pronounced these words : — <( We beseech thee also
for the unhappy person who has brought us to this state. We
should be unworthy of thy mercy if we did not from our hearts
implore it for him; he needs it, O Lord! We, in our sorrow,
have this consolation, that we are in the path where thou hast
placed us; we can offer thee our griefs and they may become
our gain. But he is thine enemy! Alas, wretched man, he is
striving with thee ! Have mercy on him, O Lord, touch his heart ;
reconcile him to thyself, and give him all those good things we
could desire for ourselves."

Rising then in haste, he said, <( Come, my children, you have
no time to lose: God defend you; his angel go with you; —
farewell ! " And while they set off with that emotion which
cannot find words, and manifests itself without them, the Father
added in an agitated tone, <( My heart tells me we shall meet
again soon."

Certainly the heart, to those who listen to it, has always some-
thing to say on what will happen; but what did his heart know?
Very little, truly, of what had already happened.

Without waiting a reply, Father Cristoforo retired with hasty
steps; the travelers took their departure, and Father Fazio shut
the door after them, bidding them farewell with even his voice a
little faltering.

9684

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

The trio slowly made their way to the shore they had been
directed to; there they espied the boat, and exchanging the pass-
word, stepped in. The waterman, planting one oar on the land,
pushed off; then took up the other oar, and rowing with both
hands, pulled out and made towards the opposite beach. Not a
breath of wind was stirring; the lake lay bright and smooth, and
would have appeared motionless but for the tremulous and gen-
tle undulation of the moonbeams, which gleamed upon it from
the zenith. No sounds were heard but the muffled and slowly
measured breaking of the surge upon the pebbly shore, the more
distant gurgling of the troubled waters dashing among the .piles
of the bridge, arid the even plash of the light sculls, as, rising
with the sharp sound of a dripping blade, and quickly plunged
again beneath, they cut the azure surface of the lake. The
waves, divided by the prow, and reuniting behind the little bark,
tracked out a curling line which extended itself to the shore. The
silent travelers, with their faces turned backwards, gazed upon
the mountains and the country, illumined by the pale light of
the moon, and diversified here and there with vast shadows.
They could distinguish the villages, the houses, and the little
cabins: the palace of Don Rodrigo, with its square tower, rising
above the group of huts at the base of the promontory, looked
like a savage standing in the dark and meditating some evil
deed while keeping guard over a company of reclining sleepers.
Lucia saw it and shuddered; then drawing her eye along the
declivity till she reached her native village, she fixed her gaze on
its extremity, sought for her own cottage, traced out the thick
head of the fig-tree which towered above the wall of the court-
yard, discovered the window of her own room, — and being seated
in the bottom of the boat, 'she leaned her elbow on the edge,
laid her forehead on her arm as if she were sleeping, and wept
in secret.

Farewell, ye mountains, rising from the waters and pointing
to the heavens! ye varied summits, familiar to him who has been
brought up among you, and impressed upon his mind as clearly
as the countenance of his dearest friends! ye torrents, whose
murmur he recognizes like the sound of the voices of home! ye
villages, scattered and glistening on the declivity, like flocks of
grazing sheep! Farewell! How mournful is the step of him
who, brought up amidst your scenes, is compelled to leave you'

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9685

Even in the imagination of one who willingly departs, attracted by
the hope of making a fortune elsewhere, the dreams of wealth at
this moment lose their charms ; he wonders he could form such a
resolution, and would even now turn back but for the hope of
one day returning with a rich abundance. As he advances into
the plain, his eye becomes wearied with its uniform extent; the
atmosphere feels heavy and lifeless; he sadly and listlessly enters
the busy cities, where houses crowded upon houses, and streets
intersecting streets, seem to take away his breath; and before
edifices admired by the stranger, he recalls with restless longing
the fields of his own country, and the cottage he had long ago
set his heart upon, and which he resolves to purchase when he
returns enriched to his own mountains.

But what must he feel who has never sent a passing wish
beyond these mountains, who has arranged among them all his
designs for the future, and is driven far away by an adverse
power! who, suddenly snatched away from his dearest habits, and
thwarted in his dearest hopes, leaves these mountains to go in
search of strangers whom he never desired to know, and is un-
able to look forward to a fixed time of return!

Farewell, native cottage — where, indulging in unconscious
fancy, one learnt to distinguish from the noise of common foot-
steps the approach of a tread expected with mysterious timid-
ity! Farewell, thou cottage, — still a stranger, but so often hastily
glanced at, not without a blush, in passing — in which the mind
took delight to figure to itself the tranquil and lasting home
of a wife ! Farewell, my church, where the heart was so often
soothed while chanting the praises of the Lord; where the pre-
paratory rite of betrothal was performed; where the secret sigh-
ing of the heart was solemnly blessed, and love was inspired,
and one felt a hallowing influence around. Farewell! He who
imparted to you such gladness is everywhere ; and he never dis-
turbs the joy of his children but to prepare them for one more
certain and durable.

Of such a nature, if not exactly these, were the reflections of
Lucia; and not very dissimilar were those of the two other wan-
derers, while the little bark rapidly approached the right bank of
the Adda.

9686 ALESSANDRO MANZONI

A LATE REPENTANCE
From <The Betrothed >

[In several chapters preceding the following affecting extract from Man-
zoni's story is described the imprisonment of Lucia Mondella, the heroine of
the tale, in the lonely castle of an outlaw. The latter is a man of rank; but
guilty of such a succession of murders, robberies, and other villainies,' during
many years, that he — in the story he is called only <The Unnamed* — has
become a terror throughout all the country-side. A sudden repentance and
remorse comes to this monster of wickedness. Hearing that the great Cardi-
nal Federigo Borromeo of Milan is arrived in the neighborhood, he decides, in
great hesitation and contrition, to visit that kindly and courageous priest.]

CARDINAL FEDERIGO was employed — according to his usual
custom in every leisure interval — in study, until the hour
arrived for repairing- to the church for the celebration of
Divine service; when the chaplain and cross-bearer entered with
a disturbed and gloomy countenance.

<(A strange visitor, my noble lord — strange indeed!"

«Who?» asked the Cardinal.

tt No less a personage than the Signer , )J replied the chap-
lain; and pronouncing the syllables with a very significant tone,
he uttered the name which we cannot give to our readers. He
then added, (< He is here outside in person, and demands noth-
ing less than to be introduced to your illustrious Grace. >}

"He!" said the Cardinal with an animated look, shutting his
book and rising from his seat : (< let him come in ! — let him
come in directly ! w

(< But — J> rejoined the chaplain, without attempting to move,
"your illustrious Lordship must surely be aware who he is: that
outlaw, that famous — >J

<(And is it not a most happy circumstance for a bishop, that
such a man should feel a wish to come and seek an interview
with him ? »

<(But — w insisted the chaplain, (< we may never speak of cer-
tain things, because my lord says it is all nonsense : but when
it comes to the point, I think it is a duty — Zeal makes many
enemies, my lord; and we know positively that more than one
ruffian has dared to boast that some day or other — w

<(And what have they done ? }) interrupted the Cardinal.

<( I say that this man is a plotter of mischief, a desperate
character, who holds correspondence with the most violent des-
peradoes, and who may be sent — w

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9687

<(Oh, what discipline is this," again interrupted Federigo, smil-
ing, "for the soldiers to exhort their general to cowardice ?>}
Then resuming a grave and thoughtful air, he continued : <( Saint
Carlo would not have deliberated whether he ought to receive
such a man: he would have gone to seek him. Let him be
admitted directly: he has already waited too long."

The chaplain moved towards the door, saying in his heart,
<( There's no remedy: these saints are all obstinate. }>

Having opened the door and surveyed the room where the
Signor and his companions were, he saw that the latter had
crowded together on one side, where they sat whispering and
cautiously peeping at their visitor, while he was left alone in one
corner. The chaplain advanced towards him, eying him guard-
edly from head to foot, and wondering what weapons he might
have hidden under that great coat: thinking at the same time
that really, before admitting him, he ought at least to have pro-
posed— But he could not resolve what to do. He approached
him, saying, (< His Grace waits for your Lordships Will you
be good enough to come with me ? w And as he preceded him
through the little crowd, which instantly gave way for him, he
kept casting glances on each side, which meant to say, "What
could I do ? don't you know yourselves that he always has his
own way ? w

On reaching the apartment, the chaplain opened the door and
introduced the Unnamed. Federigo advanced to meet him with
a happy and serene look, and his hand extended, as if to wel-
come an expected guest; at the same time making a sign to
the chaplain to go out, which was immediately obeyed.

When thus left alone, they both stood for a moment silent
and in suspense, though from widely different feelings. The
Unnamed, who had as it were been forcibly carried there by an
inexplicable compulsion, rather than led by a determinate inten-
tion, now stood there, also as it were by compulsion, torn by two
contending feelings: on the one side, a desire and confused hope
of meeting with some alleviation of his inward torment; on
the other, a feeling of self -rebuked shame at having come hither,
like a penitent, subdued and wretched, to confess himself guilty
and to make supplication to a man: he was at a loss for words,
and indeed scarcely sought for them. Raising his eyes, however,
to the Archbishop's face, he became gradually filled with a feel-
ing of veneration, authoritative and at the same time soothing;

9688

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

which, while it increased his confidence, gently subdued his
haughtiness, and without offending his pride, compelled it to give
way, and imposed silence.

The bearing of Federigo was in fact one which announced
superiority, and at the same time excited love. It was natur-
ally sedate, and almost involuntarily commanding, his figure being
not in the least bowed or wasted by age; while his solemn
yet sparkling eye, his open and thoughtful forehead, a kind of
virginal floridness, which might be distinguished even among
gray locks, paleness, and the traces of abstinence, meditation, and
labor: in short, all his features indicated that they had once
possessed that which is most strictly entitled beauty. The habit
of serious and benevolent thought, the inward peace of a long
life, the love that he felt towards his fellow-creatures, and the
uninterrupted enjoyment of an ineffable hope, had now substi-
tuted the beauty (so to say) of old age, which shone forth more
attractively from the magnificent simplicity of the purple.

He fixed for a moment on the countenance of the Unnamed
a penetrating look, long accustomed to , gather from this index
what was passing in the mind; and imagining he discovered,
under that dark and troubled mien, something every moment
more corresponding with the hope he had conceived on the first
announcement of such a visit. <( Oh ! >J cried he, in an animated
voice, "what a welcome visit is this!' and how thankful I ought
to be to you for taking such a step, although it may convey to
me a little reproof ! }>

<( Reproof ! " exclaimed the Signer, much surprised, but soothed
by his words and manner, and glad that the Cardinal had broken
the ice and started some sort of conversation.

(< Certainly it conveys to me a reproof, >} replied the Arch-
bishop, <(for allowing you to be beforehand with me when so
often, and for so long a time, I might and ought to have come
to you myself. )}

<( You come to me ! Do you know who I am ? Did they de-
liver my name rightly ? >J

<(And the happiness I feel, and which must surely be evi-
dent in my countenance, — do you think I should feel it at the
announcement and visit of a stranger ? It is you who make me
experience it; you, I say, whom I ought to have sought; you
whom I have at least loved and wept over, and for whom I
have so often prayed; you among all my children — for each

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

9689

one I love from the bottom of my heart — whom I should most
have desired to receive and embrace, if I had thought I might
hope for such a thing. But God alone knows how to work won-
ders, and supplies the weakness and tardiness of his unworthy
servants. }>

The. Unnamed stood astonished at this warm reception, in lan-
guage which corresponded so exactly with that which he had not
yet expressed, nor indeed had fully determined to express; and,
affected but exceedingly surprised, he remained silent. <( Well ! *
resumed Federigo still more affectionately, <( you have good news
to tell me ; and you keep me so long expecting it ? "

"Good news! I have hell in my heart; and can I tell you
any good tidings ? Tell me, if you know, what good news you
can expect from such as I am ? "

((That God has touched your heart and would make you his
own," replied the Cardinal calmly.

«God! God! God! If I could see him! If I could hear him!
Where is this God ? »

(< Do you ask this ? you ? And who has him nearer than you ?
Do you not feel him in your heart, overcoming, agitating you,
never leaving you at ease, and at the same time drawing you for-
ward, presenting to your view a hope of tranquillity and conso-
lation, a consolation which shall be full and boundless, as soon
as you recognize him, acknowledge and implore him ? "

c< Oh, surely ! there is something within that oppresses, that
consumes me ! But God ! If this be Gods if he be such as they
say, what do you suppose he can do with me?"

These words were uttered with an accent of despair; but
Federigo, with a solemn tone as of calm inspiration, replied: —
<( What can God do with you ? What would he wish to make of
you ? A token of his power and goodness : he would acquire
through you a glory such as others could not give him. The
world has long cried out against you; hundreds and thousands of
voices have declared their detestation of your deeds." (The Un-
named shuddered, and felt for a moment surprised at hearing such
unusual language addressed to him and still more surprised that
he felt no anger, but rather almost a relief. ) (< What glory, }> pur-
sued Federigo/ (<will thus redound to God! They may be voices
of alarm, of self-interest; of justice, perhaps — a justice so easy!
so natural! Some perhaps — yea, too many — may be voices
of envy of your wretched power; of your hitherto deplorable

9690

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

security of heart. But when you yourself rise up to condemn
your past life, to become your own accuser, — then, then indeed,
God will be glorified! And you ask what God can do with you.
Who am I, a poor mortal, that I can tell you what use such a
Being may choose henceforth to make of you ? how he can em-
ploy your impetuous will, your unwavering perseverance, when he
shall have animated and invigorated them with love, with hope,
with repentance ? Who are you, weak man, that you should
imagine yourself capable of devising and executing greater deeds
of evil, than God can make you will and accomplish in the cause
of good ? What can God do with you ? Pardon you ! save you !
finish in you the work of redemption! Are not these things noble
and worthy of him? Oh, just think! if I, a humble and feeble
creature, so worthless and full of myself — I, such as I am, long
so ardently for your salvation, that for its sake I would joyfully
give (and he is my witness!) the few days that still remain to
me, — oh, think what and how great must be the love of Him
who inspires me with this imperfect but ardent affection; how
must He love you, what must He desire for you, who has bid
and enabled me to regard you with a charity that consumes
me!»

While these words fell from his lips, his face, his expression,
his whole manner, evinced his deep feeling of what he uttered.
The countenance of his auditor changed from a wild and con-
vulsive look, first to astonishment and attention, and then gradu-
ally yielded to deeper and less painful emotions; his eyes, which
from infancy had been unaccustomed to weep, became suffused;
and when the words ceased, he covered his face with his hands
and burst into a flood of tears. It was the only and most evi'
dent reply.

(< Great and good God!" exclaimed Federigo, raising his hands
and eyes to heaven, <(what have I ever done, an unprofitable
servant, an idle shepherd, that thou shouldest call me to this
banquet of grace! that thou shouldest make me worthy of being
an instrument in so joyful a miracle ! >J So saying, he extended
his hand to take that of the Unnamed.

(< No ! w cried the penitent nobleman ; (< no ! keep away from
me: defile not that innocent and beneficent hand. You don't
know all that the one you would grasp has committed. })

<( Suffer me," said Federigo,, taking it with affectionate vio-
lence, ft suffer me to press the hand which will repair so many

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

wrongs, dispense so many benefits, comfort so many afflicted, and
be extended — -disarmed, peacefully, and humbly — to so many
enemies. }>

(< It is too much ! w said the Unnamed sobbing : <( leave me, my
lord; good Federigo, leave me! A crowded assembly awaits you;
so many good people, so many innocent creatures, so many come
from a distance, to see you for once, to hear you: and you are
staying to talk — with whom ! }>

<( We will leave the ninety-and-nine sheep, w replied the Cardi-
nal: (<they are in safety upon the mountain; I wish to remain
with that which was lost. Their minds are perhaps now more
satisfied than if they were seeing their poor bishop. Perhaps
God, who has wrought in you this miracle of mercy, is diffusing
in their hearts a joy of which they know not yet- the reason.
These people are perhaps united to us without being awrare of
it; perchance the Spirit may be instilling into their hearts an
undefined feeling of charity, a petition which he will grant
for you, an offering of gratitude of which you are as yet the
unknown object. J> So saying, he threw his arms around the neck
of the Unnamed; who, after attempting to disengage himself, and
making a momentary resistance, yielded, completely overcome by
this vehement expression of affection, embraced the Cardinal in
his turn, and buried in his shoulder his trembling and altered
face. His burning tears dropped upon the stainless purple of
Federigo, while the guiltless hands of the holy bishop affection-
ately pressed those members, and touched that garment, which
had been accustomed to hold the weapons of violence and treach-
ery/

Disengaging himself at length from this embrace, the Un-
named again covered his eyes with his hands, and raising his face
to heaven, exclaimed : — (< God is indeed great ! God is indeed
good! I know myself now, now I understand what I am; my
sins are present before me, and I shudder at the thought of
myself; yet! — yet I feel an alleviation, a joy — yes, even a joy,
such as I have never before known during the whole of my hor-
rible life ! »

(<It is a little taste, » said Federigo, "which God gives you, to
incline you to his service, and encourage you resolutely to entei
upon the new course of life which lies before you, and in which
you will have so much to undo, so much to repair, so much to
mourn over!"

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ALESSANDRO MANZONI

<( Unhappy man that I am ! w exclaimed the Signer : <( how
many, oh, how many — things for which I can do nothing besides
mourn! But at least I have undertakings scarcely set on foot
which I can break off in the midst, if nothing more: one there
is which I can quickly arrest, which I can easily undo and repair. w

Federigo listened attentively while the Unnamed briefly
related, in terms of perhaps deeper execration than we have
employed, his attempt upon Lucia, the sufferings and terrors
Of the unhappy girl, her importunate entreaties, the frenzy that
these entreaties had aroused within him, and how she was still
in the castle. . . .

(<Ah, then let us lose no time ! w exclaimed Federigo, breath-
less with eagerness and compassion. <( You are indeed blessed !
This is an earnest of God's forgiveness! He makes you capable
of becoming the instrument of safety to one whom you intended
to ruin. God bless you! Nay, he has blessed you! Do you
know where our unhappy protegee comes from ? })

The Signor named Lucia's village.

<( It's not far from this," said the Cardinal, <( God be praised;
and probably — w So saying, he went towards a little table and
rang a bell. The cross-bearing chaplain immediately attended the
summons with a look of anxiety, and instantly glanced towards
the Unnamed. At the sight of his altered countenance, and his
eyes still red with weeping, he turned an inquiring gaze upon
the Cardinal; and perceiving, amidst the invariable composure
of his countenance, a look of solemn pleasure and unusual solici-
tude, he would have stood with open mouth in a sort of ecstasy,
had not the Cardinal quickly aroused him from his contempla-
tions by asking whether, among the parish priests assembled in
the next room, there was one from .

<( There is, your illustrious Grace," replied the chaplain.

(< Let him come in directly, yy said Federigo, <( and with him the
priest of this parish. }>

The chaplain quitted the room, and on entering the hall where
the clergy were assembled, all eyes were immediately turned upon
him; while, with a look of blank astonishment, and a countenance
in which was still depicted the rapture he had felt, he lifted up
his hands, and waving them in the air, exclaimed, "Signori!
Signori! Hcec mutatio dexter cz Excelsi^ [This change is from
the right hand of the Almighty]. And he stood for a moment
without uttering another word.

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

AN EPISODE OF THE PLAGUE IN MILAN
From <The Betrothed >

[The hero of the novel, young Renzo Tramaglino, enters Milan on foot,
seeking his lost betrothed, Lucia Mondella. Among the scenes of suffering
and horror which continually meet his eyes is the following.]

RENZO had already gone some distance on his way through the
midst of this desolation, when he heard, proceeding from
a street a few yards off, into which he had been directed
to turn, a confused noise, in which he readily distinguished the
usual horrible tinkling.

At the entrance of the street, which was one of the most
spacious, he perceived four carts standing in the middle: and as
in a corn market there is a constant hurrying to and fro of people,
and an emptying and filling of sacks, such was the bustle here,
— monatti intruding into houses, monatti coming out, bearing
a burden upon their shoulders, which they placed upon one or
other of the carts; some in red livery, others without that distinc-
tion; many with another still more odious, — plumes and cloaks of
various colors, which these miserable wretches wore in the midst
of the general mourning, as if in honor of a festival. From time
to time the mournful cry resounded from one of the windows,
(< Here, monatti!* And with a- still more wretched sound, a harsh
voice rose from this horrible source in reply, (< Coming directly ! y>
Or else there were lamentations nearer at hand, or entreaties to
make haste; to which the monatti responded with oaths.

Having entered the street, Renzo quickened his steps, trying
not to look at these obstacles further than was necessary to
avoid them: his attention, however, was arrested by a remarkable
object of pity, — such pity as inclines to the contemplation of its
object; so that he came to a pause almost without determining
to do so.

Coming down the steps of one of the doorways, and advan-
cing towards the convoy, he beheld a woman, whose appearance
announced still remaining though somewhat advanced youthful-
ness; a veiled and dimmed but not destroyed beauty was still
apparent, in spite of much suffering and a fatal languo'r, — that
delicate and at the same time majestic beauty which is con-
spicuous in the Lombard blood. Her gait was weary, but not
tottering; no tears fell from her eyes, though they bore tokens of
having shed many; there was something peaceful and profound

9*94

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

in her sorrow, which indicated a mind fully conscious and sensi-
tive enough to feel it. But it was not merely her own appear-
ance which in the midst of so much misery marked her out
so especially as an object of commiseration, and revived in her
behalf a feeling1 now exhausted — extinguished — in men's hearts.
She carried in her arms ?. little child, about nine years old, now.
a lifeless body; but laid out and arranged, with her hair parted
on her forehead, and in a white and remarkably clean dress,
as if those hands had decked her out for a long-promised feast,
granted as a reward. Nor was she lying there, but upheld and
adjusted on one arm, with her breast reclining against her
mother's, like a living creature; save that a delicate little hand,
as white as wax, hung from one side with a kind of inanimate
weight, and the head rested upon her mother's shoulder with an
abandonment deeper than that of sleep; — her mother; for even
if their likeness to each other had not given assurance of the
fact, the countenance which could still display any emotion would
have clearly revealed it.

A horrible -looking monatto approached the woman, and at-
tempted to take the burden from her arms; with a kind of unusual
respect, however, and with involuntary hesitation. But she, slightly
drawing back, yet with the air of one who shows neither scorn
nor displeasure, said, (<No! don't take her from me yet: I must
place her myself on this cart — here.* So saying, she opened her
hand, displayed a purse which she held in it, and dropped it into
that which the monatto extended towards her. She then con-
tinued : <( Promise me not to take a thread from around her, nor
to let any one else do so, and to lay her in the ground thus."

The monatto laid his right hand on his heart; and then, zeal-
ously and almost obsequiously, — rather from the new feeling
by which he was, as it were, subdued, than on account of the
unlooked-for reward, — hastened to make a little room on the car
for the infant dead. The lady, giving it a kiss on the forehead,
laid it on the spot prepared for it, as upon a bed, arranged it
there, covering it with a pure white linen cloth, and pronounced
these parting words: — <( Farewell, Cecilia! rest in peace! This
evening' we too will join you, to rest together forever. In the
mean while pray for us; for I will pray for you and the others. "
Then, turning again to the monatto, "You," said she, <(when you
pass this way in the evening, may come to fetch me too; and
not me only."

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

So saying, she re-entered the house, and after an instant
appeared at the window, holding in her arms another more dearly
loved one, still living, but with the marks of death on its counte-
nance. She remained to contemplate these so unworthy obsequies
of the first child, from the time the car started until it was out
of sight, and then disappeared. And what remained for her to
do but to lay upon the bed the only one that was left her, and
to stretch herself beside it, that they might die together ? as the
flower already full blown upon the stem falls together with the
bud still infolded in its calyx, under the scythe which levels alike
all the herbage of the field.

(< O Lord ! }> exclaimed Renzo, <( hear her ! take her to thyself,
her and that little infant one: they have suffered enough! surely,
they have suffered enough ! }>

CHORUS
IN THE < COUNT OF CARMAGNOLA*

From < Modern Italian Poets, > by W. D. Howells. Copyright 1887, by
Harper & Brothers

ON THE right hand a trumpet is sounding,
On the left hand a trumpet replying,
The field upon all sides resounding
With the tramping of foot and of horse.
Yonder flashes a flag; yonder, flying
Through the still air, a bannerol glances;
Here a squadron embattled advances,

There another that threatens its course.

The space 'twixt the foes now beneath them
Is hid, and on swords the sword ringeth;
In the hearts of each other they sheathe them;

Blood runs, — they redouble their blows.
Who are these? To our fair fields what bringeth,
To make war upon us, this stranger ?
Which is he that hath sworn to avenge her,
The land of his birth, on her foes ?

They are all of one land and one nation.

One speech; and the foreigner names them
All brothers, of one generation;

In each visage their kindred is seen:

ALESSANDRO MANZONI

This land is the mother that claims them,

This land that their life-blood is steeping,
That God, from all other lands keeping,

Set the seas and the mountains between.

Ah, which drew the first blade among them,

To strike at the heart of his brother ?
What wrong or what insult hath stung them

To wipe out what stain, or to die ?
They know not: to slay one another
They come in a course none hath told them;
A chief that was purchased hath sold them;
They combat for him, nor ask why.

Ah, woe for the mothers that bare them,

For the wives of the warriors maddened!
Why come not their loved ones to tear them

Away from the infamous field ?
Their sires, whom long years have saddened.
And thoughts of the sepulchre chastened,
In warning why have they not hastened
To bid them to hold and to yield ?

As under the vine that embowers

His own happy threshold, the smiling
Clown watches the tempest that lowers

On the furrows his plow has not turned,,
So each waits in safety, beguiling
The time with his count of those falling
Afar in the fight, and the appalling

Flames of towns and of villages burned.

There, intent on the lips of their mothers,

Thou shalt hear little children with scorning,
Learn to follow and flout at the brothers

Whose blood they shall go forth to shed:
Thou shalt see wives and maidens adorning
Their bosoms and hair with the splendor
Of gems but now torn from the tender

Hapless daughters and wives of the dead.

Oh, disaster, disaster, disaster!

With the slain the earth's hidden already:
With blood reeks the whole plain, and vaster
And fiercer the strife than before!

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9697

But along the ranks, rent and unsteady,
Many waver, — they yield, — they are flying!
With the last hope of victory dying,
The love of life rises again.

As out of the fan, when it tosses

The grain in its breath, the grain flashes,
So over the field of their losses

Fly the vanquished. But now in their course
Starts a squadron that suddenly dashes
Athwart their wild flight and that stays them,
While hard on the hindmost dismays them
The pursuit of the enemy's horse.

At the feet of the foe they fall trembling,

And yield life and sword to his keeping;
In the shouts of the victors assembling,

The moans of the dying are drowned.
To the saddle a courier leaping,
Takes a missive, and through all resistance,
Spurs, lashes, devours the distance;

Every hamlet awake at the sound.

Ah, why from their rest and their labor

To the hoof-beaten road do they gather?
Why turns every one to. his neighbor

The jubilant tidings to hear ?

Thou know'st whence he comes, wretched father i
And thou long'st for his news, hapless mother!
In fight brother fell upon brother!

These terrible tidings / bring.

All around I hear cries of rejoicing;

The temples are decked; the song swelleth
From the hearts of the fratricides, voicing

Praise and thanks that are hateful to God.
Meantime from the Alps where he dwelleth
The stranger turns hither his vision,
And numbers with cruel derision

The brave that have bitten the sod.

Leave your games, leave your songs and exulting;

Fill again your battalions, and rally
Again to your banner! Insulting

The stranger descends, he is come!

9698 ALESSANDRO MANZONI

Are ye feeble and few in your sally,
Ye victors? For this he descendeth!
Tis for this that his challenge he sendeth

From the fields where your brothers lie dumb!

Thou that strait to thy children appearedst,

Thou that knew'st not in peace how to tend them,
Fatal land! now the stranger thou fearedst

Receive, with the judgment he brings!
A foe unprovoked to offend them
At thy board sitteth down and derideth,
The spoil of thy foolish divideth,

Strips the sword from the hand of thy kings.

Foolish he, too! What people was ever

For the bloodshedding blest, or oppression ?
To the vanquished alone comes harm never;

To tears turns the wrong-doer's joy!
Though he 'scape through the years' long progression
Yet the vengeance eternal o'ertaketh
Him surely; it waiteth and waketh;
It seizes him at the last sigh!

We are all made in one likeness holy,

Ransomed all by one only redemption
Near or far, rich or poor, high or lowly,
Wherever we breathe in life's air;
We are brothers by one great pre-emption
. Bound all; and accursed be its wronger,
Who would ruin by right of the stronger,

Wring the hearts of the weak with despair.

Translation of William D. Howells

THE FIFTH OF MAY

From < Modern Italian Poets, > by W. D. Howells. Copyright 1887, by
Harper & Brothers

HE PASSED: and as immovable
As, with the last sigh given,
Lay his own clay, oblivious,

From that great spirit riven,
So the world stricken and wondering
Stands at the tidings dread;

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9699

Mutely pondering the ultimate

Hour of that fateful being,
And in the vast futurity

No peer of his foreseeing
Among the countless myriads

Her blood-stained dust that tread.

Him on his throne and glorious

Silent saw I, that never —
When with awful vicissitude

He sank, rose, fell forever —
Mixed my voice with the numberless

Voices that pealed on high;
Guiltless of servile flattery

And of the scorn of coward.
Come I when darkness suddenly

On so great light hath lowered,
And offer a song at his sepulchre
That haply shall not die.

From the Alps unto the Pyramids,

From Rhine to Manzanares,
Unfailingly the thunderstroke

His lightning purpose carries;
Bursts from Scylla to Tanais, —

From one to the other sea.
Was it true glory? — Posterity,

Thine be the hard decision;
Bow we before the mightiest,

Who willed in him the vision
Of his creative majesty

Most grandly traced should be.

The eager and tempestuous

Joy of the great plan's hour,
The throe of the heart that controllessly

Burns with a dream of power,
And wins it, and seizes victory

It had seemed folly to hope,
All he hath known: the infinite

Rapture after the danger,
The flight, the throne of sovereignty,

The salt bread of the stranger;
Twice 'neath the feet of the worshipers,
Twice 'neath the altar's cope.

9700

ALESSANDRO MAJSTZONI

He spoke his name; two centuries*

Armed and threatening either,
Turned unto him submissively,

As waiting fate together;
He made a silence, and arbiter
He sat between the two.
He vanished; his days in the idleness

Of his island prison spending,
Mark of immense malignity,

And of a pity unending,
Of hatred inappeasable,

Of deathless love and true.

As on the head of the mariner,

Its weight some billow heaping,
Falls, even while the castaway,

With strained sight far sweeping,
Scanneth the empty distances

For some dim sail in vain:
So over his soul the memories

Billowed and gathered ever;
How oft to tell posterity

Himself he did endeavor,
And on the pages helplessly

Fell his weary hand again.

How many times, when listlessly

In the long dull day's declining —
Downcast those glances fulminant,

His arms on his breast entwining —
He stood assailed by the memories

Of days that were passed away;
He thought of the camps, the arduous

Assaults, the shock of forces,
The lightning-flash of the infantry,

The billowy rush of horses,
The thrill in his supremacy,
The eagerness to obey.

Ah, haply in so great agony
His panting soul had ended

Despairing, but that potently

A hand, from heaven extended.

Into a clearer atmosphere
In mercy lifted him.

ALESSANDRO MANZONI 9701

And led him on by blossoming

Pathways of hope ascending
To deathless fields, to happiness

All earthly dreams transcending,
Where in the glory celestial

Earth's fame is dumb and dim.

Beautiful, deathless, beneficent

Faith! used to triumphs, even
This also write exultantly:

No loftier pride 'neath Heaven
Unto the shame of Calvary

Stooped ever yet its crest.
Thou from his weary mortality

Disperse all bitter passions:
The God that humbleth and hearteneth,

That comforts and that chastens,
Upon the pillow else desolate

To his pale lips lay pressed!

Translation of William D. Howells.

9702

.es

MARGUERITE D'ANGOULEME

(1492-1549)

[ARGUERITE D'ANGOULEME, or as she is often styled, Marguerite
de Navarre, or Marguerite de Valois, is chiefly known as a
writer by